


A Wish Upon The Triforce

by Sinnatious



Category: The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Family Bonding, Family Drama, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-14
Updated: 2021-01-05
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:14:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28069875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sinnatious/pseuds/Sinnatious
Summary: Zelda grants Link one wish on the Triforce as a reward for saving the kingdom. He means to wish for Midna, but what he gets is family.
Relationships: The Hero's Spirit | Hero of Time | Golden Wolf & Link
Comments: 86
Kudos: 171





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A somewhat clumsy crossover attempt, partially inspired by a lot of Hero's Shade fanart I've been looking at lately. I suspect everyone might be a bit out of character in it since I've been mostly playing in the Linked Universe fandom lately but did my best. Probably riddled with canon inaccuracies that I will kindly ask you take as poetic license. Updates might be a little sporadic over the end of the year as fair warning.

Link left Epona at the stables with a fond pat, and headed towards the looming doors of Hyrule Castle. As he approached, the two guards standing at the entrance stood to attention, their armour shining so brightly in the midday sun he had to squint against the glare.

“Halt! What business do you have in the Castle?” the guard demanded.

“I was summoned?” Link ventured. He reached into his satchel, he had the letter _somewhere_ , he was sure.

“Wait, I recognise you! Link, isn’t it?” the captain asked. Link nodded sheepishly. Being recognised everywhere he went was still a novel experience. “No need for that, you’re expected, come right on through.” The captain opened the doors, and beckoned him to follow. “I’ll lead you to where the princess is waiting.”

“Thanks.”

Heading inside, he expected to be led around rubble and through empty stone hallways. The castle had taken a beating from Ganondorf after all, but in the three months since he’d last been in Hyrule Castle Town, they’d made impressive strides in repairing it. It would be many more yet before it was fully restored, but the lower levels were all largely intact and had been cleared of debris, and many of the carpets and paintings had already been restored. If he hadn’t just been outside and seen it for himself, he wouldn’t have known an entire wing of the castle was still missing.

“Have you given any more thought to joining the royal guard, lad?” the captain made conversation as they walked. “I heard the Crown extended a personal invitation to you! We’d be glad to have you on board.”

“It’s a great honour,” Link lied, “But I don’t think it’s for me. Not right now.”

“Well, just know should you ever change your mind, there’s a position waiting for you. We’re shorthanded, and having the hero who defeated that monster in our ranks would do much for morale,” the captain remarked with a friendly slap on his shoulder. Link smiled and kept his opinions on the army to himself.

Zelda was waiting in what looked to be a makeshift throne room – a throne sitting at the end of a long red carpet, curtains lining the walls, and four guards standing at attention, one in each corner of the room. Zelda herself was sitting at a desk overloaded in parchment shoved up against the wall, quill in hand.

“Your highness! The Hero has arrived as summoned,” the captain called on entry.

Zelda set the quill down and turned to him, a soft smile on her face. “Link,” she greeted. “How wonderful to see you again.”

Awkwardly, Linked bowed. Or was he supposed to kneel? He’d been briefed on the etiquette at one point, what felt like a lifetime ago, but that was back when he was nothing more than a simple farmhand, an errand boy from Ordon. Did the rules change after you saved the princess’s life?

Luckily, if he got it wrong, nobody seemed to mind. “Thank you for answering my summons so promptly,” she continued. “I hope you weren’t too inconvenienced.”

It was a royal summons. Was there any option to ignore it? “Not at all. I hope there’s no trouble?” That had been his main concern – why else would the crown summon him if _not_ for a new threat?

She covered her mouth, and with it the briefest of laughs. “Oh my, no. I would have made that clear if there was. No, this is a matter of reparations.” She stood from her desk, smoothing the silk of her dress with one careful sweep of her gloved hands. “Please, come with me. There’s something I would like to show you.”

Link sent a cautious glance at the guards, who hadn’t shifted from their position, before following at what he hoped was a respectful distance. It had been fine and easy when it was just them and Midna, but when the royal guard was present? Suddenly he had no idea how to act.

Zelda led him to wall, swept aside a curtain to reveal a door hidden there, and withdrew a golden key to unlock it. It revealed a narrow stone staircase. As the Princess reached the first step, small torches flared to life along the walls. Magic, the sort he normally only saw in temples.

“Step only on the steps I do,” Zelda instructed, “And please close the door behind you.”

Curious now, Link did so.

The staircase curved, despite the lack of windows. Link could guess they were in one of the still standing towers, but couldn’t imagine where the princess was leading him that required this kind of security. Not the dungeons – those were in the basement. Before he could give voice to the question, Zelda said, “I’ve been trying to think of a fitting reward for your services to Hyrule.”

Link blinked. That hadn’t been what he expected. “I didn’t save Hyrule for a _reward_. I don’t need one.”

“Spoken as any wielder of the Master Sword would. But I have decided that you will receive one anyway.” She glanced over her shoulder to give him a small smile. “Throughout Hyrule’s history, not all heroes have been able to be rewarded as they deserve. This time, however, it is in our power to do so, and I would see it done. Tell me, Link, is there nothing you desire?”

“Not really,” Link admitted. A mansion, maybe? What would he do with it? His treehouse was comfortable enough. A vault of rupees? The only thing he had left to spend rupees on was running his enchanted suit of armour, and that just seemed wasteful at this point. “Anything that would benefit Ordon, I suppose?” The village hadn’t seen nearly as much action as some others though, and now that the overarching threat had been dealt with, Ordon didn’t have any pressing needs. “Help repairing some of the villages that were hit by the shadow beasts, once the castle is restored?” he guessed.

“That will happen anyway,” Zelda assured him. “I anticipated your answer, however, and came up with another idea.” They finally reached the top of the staircase, and she took off one of her gloves, and placed her hand against the door. It unlocked with a whoosh of magic. _Another_ barricade?

Beyond laid a small chamber. Empty, but for a single golden triangle floating lazily in the air at its center, and Link understood.

“The Triforce, reunited,” Zelda explained, reaching out, stopping just short of touching it. On her hand the shadow of a mark glowed golden. Link’s arm twitched as his hand grew warm in response. “With the Triforce of Power reclaimed from Ganon, and my will added to yours, the Triforce is, in a sense, whole again.”

Hesitant, Link stepped closer, took off his left glove, and raised his hand as well. The light flared from all three pieces in tandem, and he quickly retracted it. “What does it mean?”

“Are you aware of the Triforce’s power?” Zelda asked.

“I know it was why I could survive Zant’s curse.”

She nodded. “That is one of its blessings. But the true reason the Triforce is so coveted is that when it is whole, it has the power to grant wishes. No matter how fantastic, no matter how grand.” She met his startled stare, gaze knowing. “So that is what I thought to offer you, Link. It isn’t something I offer lightly – but there are few souls in all of Hyrule I would trust not to misuse such an opportunity, and none who are more deserving.”

“I… I don’t know what to say.” This was far more than even a vault of rupees. “What would I even wish for?”

“Is there really nothing?” Zelda asked. “Beyond even the limits of wealth and power, there was nothing you lost? Nothing you yearned for, nothing you wished you could reclaim?”

_Midna_ , he thought, heart aching. He knew why she had to leave – knew that she had a realm to rule, that she couldn’t remain in the world of light, but… he hadn’t stopped thinking of her since. Barely an hour passed where he didn’t look over his shoulder, or open his mouth to make a comment to her, or just simply _miss_ her. The despair he felt was only marginally less than those moments when he'd thought her dead.

Still, he hesitated. “Is it really okay?” Such a power seemed dangerous – the sort that drove monsters like Zant and Ganon into existence in the first place.

“For you, yes,” Zelda assured him. “I would not offer if I thought there was any danger.”

“How does it work?”

“Simply hold your hand out, and think of your wish,” Zelda coached. Slowly, he did so, flinching when the Triforce on his hand lit up. Zelda reached out with hers as well. “Focus on your feelings, on what it is you want to fix, what it is you want to gain. Picture it clearly in your mind.”

Link never considered himself to have much of an imagination, but he closed his eyes, and tried to visualise it. What his future might look like. Tried to take those memories from his journey, from all his trials and tribulations, and transpose it into a time of peace.

“Erase your doubts, and _believe_.” Zelda’s voice floated to him as though in a dream.

_Feelings_ , she had said, so he reached for those emotions. The hollow emptiness he carried with him everywhere now. It was loneliness, in the end. He was _alone_ , and there was no one who could understand, save perhaps Zelda, who was herself a princess, who was tied to Hyrule Castle and her duties and might as well have been an entire world apart from a goat herder from Ordon, no matter how vaunted a hero he became.

He just didn’t want to be alone. He wanted someone who _understood_ , someone who went through it all with him, someone who saw him as he truly was, who didn’t put him on a pedestal-

The magic shifted, in the way a mountain might move from its resting place, and his eyes shot open to blinding golden light filling the room, turning his vision white. His ears rung with the chime of a hundred bells, and his skin prickled as though in the heart of a storm, and it built and built and built and then within the next breath, returned to abrupt stillness.

“It is done,” Zelda said into the following silence, and Link blinked the motes of light away from his sight. The room was as it was before, except the Triforce of Power floated peacefully in place, and his hand no longer glowed.

Midna was nowhere to be seen.

“I… I’m not sure it worked?” he stammered.

“No, it definitely worked.” Zelda looked thoughtful. “Though we’re not likely to find anything changed in here. I thought I sensed the magic at work nearby – we shouldn’t have to go far to see. Come with me onto the castle grounds.”

They descended the staircase again just as carefully as before. Zelda slid her glove back on, placed her hand on the exit for a moment, resting her head against it, before easing the door open. The hallway was empty when she beckoned him out, and when she let the tapestry fall, the secret doorway was fully concealed from sight once more.

“This way, I think.” The clip of her heels echoed in the stone hallway. Link followed, nervous anticipation coiling in his chest. It had been a dud, surely. But if he were to turn the corner, and see her, then… what would he say? His stomach churned, but he swallowed against it and hurried to catch up.

“Princess Zelda!” Two of the guards in the garden stood at attention. “It isn’t safe! A stranger was just spotted-”

“The stranger is who we are going to see,” Zelda interrupted pleasantly. “Thank you for your concern, but I’m quite sure with Hero who slew Ganondorf with me, I will be perfectly safe, don’t you agree?” Both guards glanced at him at that, wilting in place.

“If you say so, your highness, but I beg you-”

“Where did you say this stranger appeared?” she asked.

They hesitated. “The graveyard, your highness,” the other one answered in a hushed voice. “I was on patrol, and it was empty - then there was a bright light, like a star had fallen upon the castle. When it faded, well, the graveyard suddenly wasn’t empty anymore.”

“That sounds precisely what we are after, then,” she decided.

Link could barely hear what she was saying over the sudden thud of his heartbeat in his ears.

He had no memory of walking to the graveyard – it seemed they arrived between one eyeblink and the next. It was only when Zelda stopped in her path, hand to her mouth, with a faint, “oh my,” did he manage to focus on the figure standing before them.

It wasn’t Midna.

It was a man. Standing under the lone tree among the plots, clad in strangely familiar armour, wearing a black eyepatch, with long blonde hair that pooled over his shoulders and spilled down his back. He looked… lost.

“Link,” Zelda asked, “Do you recognise that man?”

“No,” he replied, then hesitated. That wasn’t quite true – there was something about him that he knew he’d seen before, but he couldn’t place it. Surely he would remember someone so distinctive, though – the eyepatch and the hair alone would cement him in anyone’s memory. But no, it was the armour, he decided. Steel was most common, and this armour had a brassy, almost golden sheen to it, and rather than full plate as most Hyrulean soldiers used, it straddled only the chest, shoulders, and hips. He’d seen that before, somewhere, but he couldn’t for the life of him remember where-

Then the man turned slightly, and began picking at the green leaves on his shoulders.

They weren’t fallen from the tree, like he’d first thought. They were living vines that had curled into the grooves of his shield and armour.

“No,” he said again, breathless. “I do know him. But it’s not possible…”

“Why is it not possible?”

“He’s – he’s _dead_ , I think. He was a hero who came before me, or at least, that’s what it sounded like. I met him – or his shade? - and he taught me how to swordfight.” It sounded absurd once he said it aloud, but Zelda merely looked thoughtful.

“Link,” she asked, “What exactly did you wish for?”

“I… was lonely,” Link murmured. “I thought back to my journey with Midna, and- I wanted that again, I missed her so terribly _._ So I…” His voice faltered, as he suddenly realised what had happened.

He’d wanted someone who understood. Who would look out for _him_ , rather than use him. Someone who would be able to see past the hero and just see _him_.

Zelda nodded. “The Triforce, for all of its power, seeks the path of least resistance. To reach into another realm to gain the companion your heart desired – certainly possible, even if the Princess of the Twili did not wish it so.” Link winced. He’d never considered the possibility that she might have been unhappy about it. “But when there’s another option, one already touched by the Triforce?” She hummed lightly. It sounded approving.

Because he’d not been specific enough? It had been hard to focus on the memory of Midna’s face, when he’d seen her true form for less than a day before she’d vanished forever, so he’d put more effort into the feelings he’d felt, the void he wanted to fill. So the Triforce had found another way to make his wish come true. It wasn’t Midna, but…

“Is it bad?” Zelda asked.

Link considered it. Gazed at the lost man standing in the castle graveyard, in flesh instead of bone, and felt a fierce joy grip his heart.

He hadn’t even thought he wanted it, but faced with it?

It felt right. It righted more than one wrong.

The Triforce gave second chances, and this way, it had given a second chance to them both.

“No,” Link replied. “No, I think this is exactly what I wished for.”


	2. Chapter 2

“Excuse me,” Zelda called softly to the man – the Hero’s Shade, reborn. It still seemed absurd, even faced with the evidence. The man slowly turned to look at her. His uncovered eye was bright blue, and Link latched onto that fact, filed it away carefully in his memory. He’d never wondered what colour his mentor’s eyes truly were, but now that he knew, the knowledge felt precious and important. “Do you know where you are?”

He blinked at that, and looked around, then shook his head. His gaze caught on Link, and lingered there, the faintest of frowns on his face.

Link cleared his throat, and stepped forward. “Do you remember?” he asked. “We’ve met before.”

The man shook his head. “You look… familiar,” he admitted, “But I don’t recall such a meeting.”

Link’s heart, so briefly buoyed, abruptly sank. The man didn’t appear to notice, turning his attention to Zelda instead. “You’re dressed like the Queen,” he murmured. “But you’re not Zelda.”

Her lips quirked into the smallest of smiles. “I am, in fact, Zelda. But I suspect you might be confusing me for one of my predecessors. My great-great-great grandmother, perhaps – she was named Zelda. Or _her_ grandmother as well, I believe.”

He took that news better than Link would have. He simply frowned, and asked, “How?”

“A wish, upon the Triforce.”

His frown deepened. “’That’s impossible. The Triforce is broken. The Triforce of Power is locked away in another realm.”

Zelda’s gaze was sharp. “Then it’s true. You’re the Hero of Time.”

Link looked between them. The man didn’t refute it. “The Hero of Time?” he prodded.

“It isn’t a tale known outside the royal family,” Zelda explained to him. “And even then, the only reason I learned of it at all was because I looked into the history of Ganondorf when his imprisonment finally failed. The official records state very little on it beyond the curiosity of his failed execution, and his eventual imprisonment using the Mirror of Twilight over a hundred years ago.”

The Hero of Time stood at attention at that. “Ganondorf finally broke free, then?”

“You need not worry. Your successor has already dealt with him,” Zelda assured him.

Link held up his hand awkwardly and muttered, “Hi?”

The man’s gaze was hard, and judging. Link held fast. It still wasn’t as bad as the first few times he faced down the Hero’s Shade. “I’m Link,” he said. “What’s your name?”

“Link?” Link nodded. The man looked away. “…Link as well.”

Link tried not to gape. He’d been named for his ancestor? He’d never known.

“By your surprise, it seems I never disclosed that in our previous meetings,” the Hero of Time noted. “What did you know me as then?”

Link shook himself. “Um, you never introduced yourself. Midna and I simply referred to you as the Hero’s Shade.”

“I see.” He let out a small hum. “Then Shade will do.”

“You wish to only go by that?” Zelda asked.

“It seems simpler, in this situation,” he replied. “I am not in my original time, and I don’t have any other name.”

“Shade,” Link tried. It was unsettling to use the word for a living person, but it worked well enough.

“I suppose thanks are in order, also,” the Hero of Time continued. “For managing to defeat Ganondorf so soundly, when even the Seven Sages failed. I suspected that his prison wouldn’t hold him forever, but it’s still concerning to hear.” He glanced up at the castle, and the scaffolding surrounding the damaged walls. “It doesn’t seem like it was an easy battle.”

“Fortunately, Link was up to the task,” Zelda assured him.

“It was thanks to you,” Link blurted. “I mean, not only thanks to you, I couldn’t have done it without Midna or the Princess either, but… well, you trained me. I was a novice swordsman when I started out. I wouldn’t have even survived my first few battles if you hadn’t sought me out and taught me what I needed to know.”

“Is that so?” The man considered him, and his eye flicked to Link’s still-uncovered hand, where the shadow of the Triforce’s mark lingered. “It’s rather a shame, then, that I can’t remember it.”

“It’s quite interesting,” Zelda commented. “Given your memories, I first thought that perhaps you had been whisked here from the moment before your death. But your hair and the state of your armour suggest otherwise.”

Shade glanced at the vines crawling over his shield, and shrugged. “It’s still possible,” he admitted. “The place where I last remember falling…” He cut himself off abruptly.

“I suppose we should be glad the Triforce provided you with a tunic, at least. The guards might have reacted even worse if you turned up in armour and nothing else,” Zelda quipped.

He smiled then, and the expression left Link off-balance – he’d never once imagined the Hero’s Shade being able to _smile_. It was a grim, amused little thing, but that one gesture abruptly turned him into someone _human_.

He was here. Right in front of him. The Hero’s Shade – the Hero of Time - his ancestor, alive and in the flesh.

Link had no idea what to do with that. Luckily, Zelda seemed to.

“Please, come inside,” she invited him. “You must be hungry? Tired, perhaps? It’s not every day someone is brought into a different era.”

“It’s actually happened more times than I care to admit,” Shade remarked. “There’s no need for me to impose upon your hospitality, your highness.”

“I insist,” she said, with the delicacy of an invitation but the steel of a royal order. Shade glanced at him then, and Link just shrugged. After Midna, he’d become far too used to just going along with pushy princesses.

“If it would please you, then,” he replied formally with a slight bow.

“There is no need to stand on ceremony with me,” Zelda assured him. “You either, Link. Please relax, both of you.”

Link held up his hands in mock surrender. Shade’s eye caught on his hand again, and his face tightened.

Right, the Triforce mark. It seemed to bother him. Link pulled his glove from where he’d folded it on his belt and slipped it back on without comment as Zelda led the way out of the graveyard.

“The sun will be setting soon,” she said. “I’ll arrange you both rooms for the night. There is plenty of room in the stables for your horse, as well.”

“Oh, we can stay in one of the inns in Castle Town-” Link started to say, internally sweating at the thought of staying at the castle.

“We have the space,” she said firmly. “And I should like to share at least one meal with a man who knew my great-great-great-grandmother personally. Stay the night, have dinner.”

Put like that, neither of them could disagree. And while that didn’t mean _Link_ had to stay, he didn’t want to let the other man out of his sight – some part of him scared that the Triforce would whisk him away as easily as it had brought him back, that he might vanish into the Ghostly Ether the minute Link’s back was turned.

That was how, as the sun began to set, he found himself sitting at an overlong banquet table in a vast stone dining hall with Princess Zelda and the revived Hero of Time, while maids and guards stood at the edges of the room and Link was paralysed by the array of cutlery before him. The only consolation he had was that the Hero of Time seemed just as lost.

Zelda simply sipped her tea. She knew _exactly_ how out of their depth they were, and this was what -entertainment? Some royal form of hazing? This was the kind of prank Midna would pull, and it was no longer so surprising how quickly the two princesses had got along.

She eventually seemed to take pity on them. “Forgive me, Shade, I’ve overlooked how much things might have changed since my grandmother’s time. Perhaps I could arrange some modern etiquette lessons?”

“It would do little good. I’m afraid that though I did quite a bit work for the crown, it was never the sort that was celebrated with royal banquets,” Shade remarked dryly. “What little table manners I have was picked up from inns and farmhouses.”

“Me too,” Link hurried to add, even though it wasn’t strictly true – he ate with other families in Ordon often enough, and Uli had been a right bear about table manners, but he somehow doubted Uli’s rules were enough for this situation.

Zelda waved it off. “Do as I do then, and worry yourselves not over the details. Royal etiquette is a matter for power games among noblefolk, and nothing you need to be concerned with unless you do want to attend banquets and balls.” With some of the pressure off, they began eating - and the food _was_ delicious, and varied. Spiced meats, desert fruits, colorful salads with greens and delicacies from every edge of Hyrule - including, Link noted proudly, a chunk of Ordon cheese. He might have even been able to enjoy himself, but it seemed as soon as Link could even hope to clean his plate, it was whisked away beneath his fork and replaced with another. He valiantly did not startle, even as he started to eye the servants around the room nervously. He didn’t even see them _move_ half the time.

Zelda acted as though everything was normal, however, asking the Hero of Time countless questions about her ancestor. And it _was_ interesting – she sounded like a fascinating woman, though there was a strangeness to the stories, as though Shade would correct himself partway through. More faulty memories, possibly, and Link tamped down a twinge of concern that perhaps his resurrection hadn’t been able to restore his mind fully.

“So,” Zelda began in a lull between dishes and conversation. “I am curious as to what your plans are next.”

“I’m afraid to admit I’m at a loss,” Shade confessed. “It seems that your Hyrule is at peace, and the threat of Ganondorf has been dealt with. Though you say I’ve been brought here with a wish upon the Triforce, I’m not certain _why_. Especially not when Hyrule seems to have a fully capable Hero already.”

Link’s face burned. His words were stuck in his throat.

“It was something of an unintentional result, though a welcome one,” Zelda explained when the silence at the table stretched too long. “Though it’s rather interesting how you heroes all have the same reaction – Link also assumed I had summoned him to the castle for a problem, when it was very much the opposite.” She folded her hands under her chin, and fixed them with an amused smile. “I have a suggestion then, if I may. Why not go with Link here? He can show you around the kingdom – I’m sure much has changed in the past hundred years. And I would rest easier knowing that Hyrule’s beloved hero isn’t all alone on the road.”

Shade sent him a considering glance. “If it would not inconvenience you,” he said slowly.

“Not at all!” Link blurted. “I’d be honoured!”

“Then it’s settled,” Zelda declared. “I assume you have no rupees, so we will arrange a horse for you as well. I’m sure some spare clothes can be found too, since I imagine that is your only set?”

“I’m afraid what you see here is all I have,” Shade admitted. “Though I am a simple man, and used to living off the land. I can make do with very little.”

“These are trifles for us to provide. Link has proven difficult to reward for his efforts in saving Hyrule, so it is in fact, refreshing to supply a hero with such basic necessities,” Zelda remarked. “And I’m quite sure it would please my grandmother to have it so.”

“Hyrule was not quite so prosperous then,” Shade murmured. “But if you are sure it will be no trouble, I will not deny your generosity.”

“I’ll take care of it.” Zelda set down her teacup, and that seemed to declare dinner over – the staff cleared the remaining plates and hovered nearby, waiting to pull back their chairs as they stood. It was unnerving. Did all royalty live like this? Did Midna’s people do the same for her? It was difficult to imagine.

As always, his heart ached at the thought of his companion, of her final farewell – the careful flick of her finger shattering the mirror, closing the way between them forever. But he could not linger on it, because Zelda was instructing one of the staff to show them to the baths and their rooms and all too quickly their time together was coming to a close.

“I have other engagements in the morning, so I may not have the opportunity to see you off,” Zelda apologised. “But please, both of you know that you are always welcome here, for whatever reason.”

“You are too kind, your highness,” Shade said, with a shallow bow. Link hurried to mimic it.

“Thank you,” Link whispered to her, just before they parted ways. The words seemed insufficient – not just for the opportunity, but everything she’d done that afternoon and evening, while he floundered in confusion and embarrassment, and she so smoothly took things in hand and arranged everything.

Zelda simply smiled at him, and whispered back, “Find happiness, Link, for both of you.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be a bit of a delay between the next couple of chapters sorry, thanks for your patience.

The next morning, they were informed Zelda had indeed arranged a second horse for Shade – an old dapple-grey warhorse whose knight had died fighting the shadow beasts. In Link’s opinion, he was no Epona, but the stable hand promised them that while he wasn’t fast or particularly spry, he was a strong steed and startled at nothing.

“His name’s Grey, apparently,” Link informed him as he handed over the reins. “Not terribly original, but should be easy to remember.” Shade took them with comfortable familiarity, patting the horse on the neck.

“I will have to thank the Princess for her generosity,” was all he said in response. He’d tied his hair back in a loose braid, though long blond strands still escaped, hanging loose to frame his face. He’d also removed the vines crawling over his shield and armour, rendering him a much more normal - if imposing - looking knight. He nodded at Epona. “That is a fine mare you have there.”

Link grinned. “Her name’s Epona. She’s the _best_.” He checked the saddlebags one last time. “You have everything?” The castle servants had loaded Shade up with food and clothes and a waterskin and who knew what else.

Shade nodded, and so they were soon leading their horses through Castle Town. On his way through it had been a slow affair that took most of the morning, as various people would call out to him or stop him in his path, some to talk, some who simply wanted to shake his hand or offer him work or their daughter’s hand in marriage or other similarly ridiculous things. This time though, with Shade walking beside him, most kept their distance. He was a tall man, and the eyepatch and armour made him intimidating, he supposed, or maybe it just looked like Link was on official business of some kind. Still, it left him free to point out areas of interest on their way through. Shade didn’t comment much, though his gaze didn’t stop roving the entire time, taking everything in.

Soon enough though, they were out beyond the walls, with only rolling plains ahead of them, and they were truly alone for the first time.

Link gazed out over the rolling plains of Hyrule Field, considering. The Howling Stones were the most sensible place to begin. If the Hero of Time made those, then they were parts of Hyrule he’d been before. “The one by Zora River is probably a good place to start,” he mused, and swung a leg up over Epona, and urged her into a trot.

Shade followed suit on his horse a moment later, and for the first time since leaving the town, spoke. “I should ask, now that we’re out of the hearing of the Princess, if this is truly what you want.”

Linked blinked. “Of course it is. I’ve just been travelling around, after… after everything.” Link didn’t know how to summarise the whole affair with Ganondorf and the Twilight Realm to anyone who hadn’t lived through it. “The Princess’s suggestion was as much for me as for you – I might as well show you around Hyrule. It’ll be interesting for both of us, I think.”

“It seems a lot for a man you don’t know, though,” he remarked. “Are you at that much of a loose end?”

Link hummed, considering his words carefully. “It’s not just that. You – or rather, the version of you I met – once said that we were family. That the techniques you were teaching me were for your bloodline, that I was your descendant as well as your successor. And since we’re family, it’s only natural for me to want to help, right?”

Shade went quiet at that, keeping pace with him in pensive silence. He didn’t speak again until they’d left sight of the castle, heading into the winding roads that led towards Zora’s Domain.

“I feel I should apologise,” he eventually said. “For forgetting all the times we met before.”

“There’s no need,” Link assured him. “You can hardly help it.”

“No,” Shade agreed. “But I know what it is like, to be forgotten. And I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. So I’m sorry.”

Link paused at that, casting his revived mentor a worried glance. “…It’s fine,” he eventually settled on. “I won’t pretend that I wasn’t disappointed at first, but the more I think about, the more I wonder if it isn’t for the best. That place I met you, the Ghostly Ether – I don’t think people are supposed to stay there very long. And you’d been there a while.” A hundred years, apparently.

“I don’t understand it,” Shade murmured. “Why I’ve been brought back like this, in a time of peace.”

He should tell him, he thought. It was the perfect opportunity to admit that it was _his_ wish, explicitly, that brought the Hero of Time back from a cursed death into existence, and not some mis-firing side effect of a different wish on the Triforce as Zelda had implied.

He couldn’t find the words, though – they stuck in his throat. After a couple of days, he promised himself. It was an excuse, perhaps, but it was a good one – it gave his mentor the chance to get to know him, again, for them to get to know _each other_ properly.

“Isn’t it a good thing?” he said instead. “I don’t think I’m ready for another fight like that one anytime soon.”

Shade slanted him a glance so neutral Link could read nothing from it. “I suppose,” he muttered.

They fell into silence after that, and remained that way for most of the morning as they rode towards the Highlands. The path between the Castle Town and Zora’s Domain was mostly peaceful – with the threat of shadow beasts gone, the remains of the army had taken up patrolling the major roads again, clearing them of monsters regularly as they used to. Link had been doing much the same as he idled for something to do.

It meant they made excellent time – Link estimated they could reach the Howling Stone by sunset, and camp there for the night before moving on. “There’s a safe grotto to leave the horses at just ahead. We’ll probably have to go the rest of the way on foot.” The paths following the river upstream were too narrow and treacherous to risk it.

“Are we going to Zora’s Domain?”

“I hadn’t planned on it, but it might not be bad to stop in to see how Prince Ralis is doing,” Link considered. “Zora are quite long-lived, aren’t they? Any chance any of them might remember you?”

Shade gave him a thin, bitter smile. “Only one, and she passed well before her time.”

“Oh.” Link didn’t know what to do with that. Maybe stopping by the Domain wasn’t a good idea then – the last thing he wanted was to bring up painful memories. He wanted to soothe his mentor’s regrets, not enhance them. “We’ll skip it then. The Zora got hit hard by the shadow beasts – they’re still adjusting to losing their Queen. I try not to bother them unless there’s something I can help with.”

“Ganondorf’s power reached far then. In so little time?” Shade asked.

“A lot can happen in a couple of months,” Link remarked. Looking back, it felt like years had passed, but in the thick of it seemed like only days as he lurched from one crisis to the next. There had been quiet moments, peaceful moments where he stopped to catch his breath – passing out in an inn in the middle of the day and not waking up until the next morning, catching bugs for Agitha, more afternoons than he cared to admit spent fishing as he waited for the exhaustion and ache of a difficult battle to fade – but it had been little more than brief pauses in the chaos as he toiled to rid the land of Zant’s and Ganondorf’s influence.

They dropped the horses off at the grotto – there was a creek for water and plenty of grass, and nothing would bother them there. And if it did, Epona was a smart horse, and Grey seemed content to plod along after her, they’d be fine. From there, they hiked on foot along the river on a goat trail – a shortcut Link had found as a wolf. The sun was sinking into the horizon, painting the sky pink as they arrived at the small clearing with the Howling Stone.

“Here it is. Recognise it?” Link asked, pointing at the stone.

“Am I supposed to?” Shade asked, but he approached the stone anyhow, listening intently to the faint whistle of the wind.

“These were how I’d find you, after our first meeting,” Link explained. “I’d play the song, and you’d answer, and I’d go find your spirit wolf? Then you’d pull me into the Ghostly Ether and teach me to fight. I’d assumed you made them.”

“No, I don’t remember making this. I found some stones that would play music on my travels, and experimented with it, but I never succeeded in finishing one myself. This song though…”

“What is it?” Link asked.

“The Requiem of Spirit.” He quirked him a small grin. “If what you say about meeting my ghost through one of these is true, it seems I still had a sense of humour.”

A morbid one. Still, he hadn’t considered that the Howling Stones were something made by the Hero’s Shade, and not the Hero of Time while he was alive. “I was wondering how you did it, or what their original purpose was. But if it happened after you died, then I suppose that answers that.” It had just been the Hero’s Shade looking for a way to reach out and prepare Hyrule’s next hero. It explained the locations of them, too – places that no average Hylian was likely to tread.

“There used to be a Sheikah Stone here. I can only imagine I repurposed it,” Shade mused, running a careful hand across the moss-covered stone.

“Sheikah Stone?” Link asked blankly.

“You never came across any?” Shade asked. “Stones with the Sheikah symbol on them. If you struck them, they would tell you the time. With the right tools, however, they could carry messages.” At Link’s expression, he picked up a stick, and traced a symbol in the dirt – it looked like an eye with an overlarge teardrop. “They were engraved with this.”

Link frowned. “It looks a bit like the wooden statue – oh! A goron mentioned the Sheikah tribe to me once. I’ve never met any, though.”

Shade raised an eyebrow. “Truly? But we met quite a few of them at the castle.”

“We did?”

“At dinner. All the staff were Sheikah. They were being rather overt about it – threatening us, I thought.” He looked amused. “You didn’t notice?”

The only thing he’d noticed was how bizarrely stealthy Zelda’s servants were. “Is the Princess safe?”

“They’re sworn in service to the protection of the royal family, so quite safe, I would think.”

Link scowled. “They weren’t very effective, then, when Ganondorf took her prisoner.” How had he never heard about them before?

“Wisdom over valour is the Sheikah way. Even in my time, the Sheikah couldn’t defeat Ganondorf, and knew better than to try. That you didn’t meet any though, suggests they’ve gone fully underground. It is very like them to prefer to operate unseen from the shadows.” His amusement dwindled at that, as he moodily stared into the distance. He shook himself, and turned his attention back to the Howling Stone. “Tell me then, what do you play, if you played the songs on the stones?”

Link froze. “I uh, I don’t actually play any instrument.”

Shade looked interested. “Did you sing it then?”

Linked grimaced. “I have an awful singing voice. Your ghost might have killed me for real.” He sighed. He might as well get it over with. “I uh, howled it.”

Shade turned fully to him, eyebrows raised.

“Maybe it’s easier if I just show you.” If they were going to travel around together, it would probably come up eventually. “Don’t freak out.” Link reached for the dark crystal containing Zant’s curse, and held his breath as the darkness crawled over his head, cold and prickling. He dropped to all fours as the transformation took over, squeezing his eyes shut as his vision shifted and fur rippled across his body.

It only took a matter of moments, then he was staring up at Shade through the eyes of a wolf.

To his credit, his mentor took it in stride, merely looking thoughtful. “That’s a powerful curse if I’ve ever seen one. But useful, I expect?” He knelt, running a quick hand through Link’s fur. “Ah, apologies, I should have asked first. But your fur is very soft!” he laughed. Link whuffed, and leaned into the touch again. It was a far better reaction than running scared as most people did when they saw his wolf form. And it felt nice, besides – Midna used to run her hands through it whenever they would stop and rest, and it had become just another thing he missed about her.

“Very well, then,” Shade said, and resumed ruffling his fur. “This is a little odd, but I’ve seen weirder. You can’t talk in this form, I take it?” Link shook his head. Shade let out a hum. “I had a mask once that might have helped. But it seems lost to time.” He stepped away, and Link took the hint to transform back. “It doesn’t hurt?” he asked.

Link stretched, shaking off the sensation of the transformation. “The first time it was agonising – I thought I would die. Now it’s just briefly uncomfortable.”

“Something that happened on your journey to save Hyrule, I take.”

“Yeah. A Twili curse. It took the Master Sword to break it – and then we turned it into a weapon.” He grinned savagely at the thought. It had been satisfying to take that which Zant had intended to cripple him with and use it against him. “You don’t seem all that surprised.”

“I’ve seen much on my journeys, same as you no doubt,” Shade remarked. “Sometimes I wonder if anything can shock me anymore.” His hand rested on the Howling Stone, thumb tracing the bumps in the rock repetitively. He turned his gaze skyward. “It’s getting dark.”

Link nodded. “We might as well make camp here for the night. We’re not in any rush.” The sky was spotty with clouds – it would be a dark night, and not one he wanted to navigate narrow highland paths on.

They still had food from the castle, so camp involved little more than gathering enough wood for a fire, which Shade had lit in a moment while Link’s back was turned. They settled down to eat in comfortable silence – Link much more at ease now at least one of his secrets had been aired.

Shade had proven remarkably easy to get along with so far. It had only been a day, but it was already so different to what he’d expected. The Hero’s Shade had been a harsh teacher, brutal and unforgiving in his assessments. It had been exactly what Link had needed at the time, and after that first encounter, when he realised that strange, aggressive stalfos actually had his best interests at heart, that he was teaching him the skills he _needed_ to survive – he’d come to value it. His quest came first, but he’d never stopped looking for the Howling Stones, and the times when his thoughts weren’t occupied by Midna or other more urgent worries, he wondered about the strange, armoured stalfos with one eye.

Some part of him had thought that the Hero of Time revived would be the same – gruff, critical, stern. And he _was_ standoffish, still, but there was an air of awkwardness to it. He laughed, and smiled, even if rarely. But more than that, Link was slowly realising that he was _young_. Alarmingly young. Link had pictured a solider approaching Rusl’s age, but he was mid twenties at best – only a few years older than him. The eyepatch and his general air of weariness made him seem older, but there were no wrinkles on his face, no grey in his long blond hair.

It made a certain degree of sense. The Hero’s Shade had spoken of regrets, of his failure to pass his legacy on, so it stood to reason he died young.

Link desperately wanted to ask how it happened. But it seemed too soon for such a personal question, so instead, as they finished dinner, he asked, “Do you want to go fishing tomorrow? There’s a fishing hole near here.” It was a relaxing activity, an easy way to kill a day.

“Fishing? Certainly.” He hesitated. “I still have no rupees though-”

“I’ll pay for it,” Link assured him. “The boat hire costs the same for two people as one anyway.”

“Boat hire?”

“Yeah. How else would you do it?”

“I’ve only ever done it from the shoreline.” There was a light of excitement in his eye – the most he’d shown for anything so far.

Link grinned. “It’ll be something new then. You can catch all those fish that hang out in the middle of the lake.”

“I look forward to it.” He frowned, though, as he poked idly at the campfire with a stick. “I’ll still need to acquire some rupees at some point. I can hardly rely on your generosity indefinitely.”

He could, but Link understood the desire not to. In his shoes, no amount of reassurances would make him not feel a burden. “What did you do to earn rupees before? Were you a knight?”

He chuckled. “Heavens, no.”

“Your armour, though-”

“Found scavenging ruins, like most everything of value I owned. Generally, I foraged or hunted, or bartered and traded for things. Sometimes I would do mercenary work for the crown, or odd jobs for whoever needed it – there was a ranch that used to pay me in milk for helping out on farm chores whenever they were shorthanded.”

A little bit like what Link had been doing since the battle with Ganondorf ended. “Where did you live that made that possible, then?”

“Oh, around,” he said vaguely. “I spent most of my time on the road, ever since I was young.”

“I see.” Link turned his attention to the crackling fire, feeding it another stick, unsure of what more to say.

Shade was both far younger and far more genial than he’d expected his mentor to be. But even after only one day, some of the things he said left an odd pit in Link’s stomach.

He hoped he was just overthinking it.


	4. Chapter 4

It turned out the Hero of Time was a beast at fishing. He was also a damn tile worm at heart, who only laughed when his overenthusiastic angling nearly capsized the boat with both of them in it. It wasn’t until the third time he’d done it that Link realised it was _on purpose_.

The sound of that laughter – untainted with bitterness - was enough for Link to forgive him, but he still found himself gripping the edge of the boat a little more frequently than he normally would have.

They stayed the night at the fishing hole and returned to the horses the next day. From there, Link was less sure of what to do next. Snowpeak to visit the Yetis? It was unbearably cold at this time of year though, and Shade didn’t have any furs. Death Mountain to visit the Gorons? He was nervous of bringing it up after the reaction to the Zora. He wanted to avoid the Hidden Village for the same reason.

In the end, Lake Hylia seemed safest. There was another fishing hole there, and when he brought it up, his travelling companion had been amenable to the idea.

Their peaceful journey wasn’t to last, however. They were halfway along the road to Lake Hylia when all-too-familiar hissing erupted in the long grass around them.

“Lizalfos,” Link cursed. Further from the Lakebed temple than he normally found them. He leapt from Epona’s back, slapping her flank once to send her running the other way. Lizalfos were a pain to fight from horseback. Shade did the same next to him, circling to his back as half a dozen of the lizard-like monsters surrounded them.

Link drew his sword and leapt for the nearest lizalfos, not giving it the chance to attack first. He struck once, twice, and it went down on the third, then he was dancing back to avoid the whipping tail blade of its fellow. He heard clashing steel behind him but he couldn’t turn to look, not with two other lizalfos advancing on him. He stepped back quickly, not letting them flank him – they couldn’t attack simultaneously without getting in each other’s way.

One of them finally got impatient, lunging for him with a hiss. Link darted to the side and speared it in the neck – it collapsed with a keening cry. He wrenched his blade free and darted forward, jabbing another strike into the third’s stomach. It snapped at him, teeth scraping his arm, but he twisted the blade, driving it deeper, before yanking it out and leaping back. It staggered a step, and collapsed.

Link huffed. It was too quiet. The others-

He whirled to find the other three lizalfos dead on the ground, Shade standing over them, watching him calmly. “The blades on their tails is new,” he commented, not even out of breath.

He relaxed. He’d been aware enough that the other lizalfos weren’t in range to be a threat, but for a moment he’d forgotten he wasn’t fighting alone. “Thanks for taking care of the rest.”

Shade inclined his head. “You’re quite an accomplished swordsman,” he remarked. “I suspect I could have sat back and you would have easily handled them all on your own.”

It was true enough – he’d fought plenty of lizalfos on his adventure - but his face warmed at the praise regardless. “You’re not so bad yourself, to take three down that quickly.”

The man’s lips quirked at that, to something that was almost a smile. “I’ve a mind for a spar, if you’re willing.”

“Here?” In the middle of a road scattered with the bodies of lizalfos?

Shade shrugged. “It’s as good as anywhere. Unless you don’t want to?”

A spar, with his living mentor? His blood was already rushing at the thought. “I’m game, but are _you_ sure? I don’t want to get in trouble for beating up my elders.”

It was a risky taunt – but Shade’s answering smirk confirmed it had landed correctly. “A big head from beating Ganondorf, I see. But don’t forget-” Shade raised his blade, settling into a familiar inviting stance opposite him. “I defeated Ganondorf once, too.”

Link barely suppressed a grin as he lay his blade flat, touching his opponent’s sword, before withdrawing to a defensive position. _This_ felt familiar – a dance he’d performed with the Hero’s Shade half a dozen times, and to repeat those motions in the open air with sunlight on his back in the middle of Hyrule Field was like a dream come true.

“By your leave,” Shade invited.

Link struck.

Shade sidestepped his strike, and returned it in swift kind. Link deflected it with his shield at the last moment, the impact ringing in his ears, then darted to his flank, meeting only air.

They parried back and forth for a few minutes, taking each other’s measure. Shade moved with a surety, with decisiveness. He made no wasted movements. Despite the fact that in the end Link had defeated the Hero’s Shade, that his teacher had conceded he had nothing left to teach him, he still wondered if he could win a battle against this version of him. Against a slow, lumbering stalfos version of him, it had been hard enough. And Shade was quick, surprisingly light on his feet, and his stance gave little away.

His opponent went on the offensive, and Link backstepped frantically, barely avoiding a flurry of brutally fast strikes. He tried to counterattack, and his sword bounced off the shield with a clang. He spun with the momentum of the failed strike, but by the time he struck back, Shade was already gone.

The whistle of a blade through the air was all the warning Link received. He brought up his shield on instinct, ducking behind it, pushing forward against the blow instead of back.

Then it was there, finally, an opening –the force of his block putting his opponent’s footing wrong, and Link twisted, and spun, and struck Shade to the ground. He hit the earth with a thud, and Link leapt forward, sword hovering, point-down over his chest.

“I think we can call that your win,” Shade said. “Impressive.” He accepted Link’s offered hand to pull him back to his feet.

“You’re the one who taught me,” Link pointed out between huffing breaths. Shade on the other hand seemed barely winded. It didn’t matter though, he’d still _won_. His cheeks hurt from smiling.

“It shows,” Shade admitted. “It’s almost like fighting my shadow. I might have to come up with some new techniques to have a chance.”

“You made me work for it,” Link promised.

“Shadows always do.”

There was an unsettling note to his words that gave Link pause. He shook it off, though, with a candid, “I know you have more techniques than you used in your quiver. I think you might have gone easy on me.”

“That you know that means you kept some things up your sleeve too,” Shade noted. “Of course I’m not going to use my deadliest tricks for a friendly spar.” He patted him on the shoulder. “You won fairly and with honour. Thank you for indulging my curiosity.”

Link felt as though his heart might burst. The Hero’s Shade had already said as much, before he seemed to disappear forever, but to hear it out loud, from the living, breathing version of him was like the warmth of a campfire on a cold night. As a child he’d been addicted to such simple praises – every kind word from Rusl, or Mayor Bo, or Ilia, hoarded like a starving squirrel preparing for winter. Yet just a few words from Shade and Link felt as though it was enough for a year.

Was it different because he was truly family? Or was it just because he knew firsthand how hard to impress the Hero’s Shade had been?

He focused on getting out his horse call, mostly to hide the blush rising on his face. “I’ll just call Epona back, now that we’re done. Hopefully Grey follows too,” Link said. He whistled Epona’s song, and heard a distant whinny in response. Good, the horses hadn’t wandered too far.

Shade grabbed his shoulder suddenly - grip so tight it hurt. "That song," he said, voice hoarse. "Where did you learn it?"

Link frowned, puzzled by the sudden intensity. “My mother, I think. I don’t remember her very well, honestly, but I remember she would always hum it in the stables. It’s useful for calling Epona – she always comes running when she hears it.” He winced, dropping his shoulder slightly.

Shade abruptly released him with a muttered apology. “I'm sorry. It just... surprised me. It answers some questions, most likely.”

"Questions?"

"About how we might be related." He had a fond, wistful look in his eye. “There was a woman – her family owned a ranch in Hyrule field. That song was passed down from mother to daughter. She taught it to me, too. She would be delighted to know it survived all these years to pass down to you.”

“Was she your wife?” Link leaned forward, thirsty for any knowledge of his heritage. He’d lost his parents so young, before he could learn anything about his history – he remembered only a few things from his mother, mostly things she’d taught him, and nothing at all of his father.

“My wife? No, of course not.” Shade looked awkward. “There was a time when I was… lonely, I suppose. And I took company wherever it was offered.”

That… wasn’t at all what he expected. The Hero of Time was many things, but in the short few days they’d travelled together, he hadn’t struck Link as the womanising sort – like the soldiers who would roll through town and bed every woman they could, only to disappear a few weeks later, reassigned to a new post where they would do it all again. “You just left her to raise the child alone?”

It was disappointing, in a way – Link had wanted to imagine a family that might have been, a loving marriage and a husband called away to war, perhaps. There was something terribly unromantic about learning that his lineage came from a hero carelessly sleeping around, leaving a ranch woman to raise a fatherless child out of wedlock. It was distant enough in that past that it was mostly simply interesting, rather than shameful, but it did take the shine off the fantasy of it.

“I never knew,” Shade admitted in a low voice. “I wish I had. Maybe if I’d known, I would have come back, married her. If it were Malon. She was – she was kind, always. Raising a family with her wouldn’t have been such a bad dream. And maybe, if I knew that was possible, maybe then I would never have gone-” He cut himself off.

The horses galloped up then – Epona first, Grey following at a more sedate place, rescuing Link from finding some way to respond to that.

Still, he was unsettled. The pride and warmth from winning the spar and Shade’s approval turned hollow and cold in his stomach. He grasped for that feeling again, and couldn’t understand why it kept turning to smoke between his fingers.

Something was wrong, but he couldn’t figure out what.


	5. Chapter 5

The rest of their journey to Lake Hylia went peacefully. Link put the strange anxiety curling in the back of thoughts aside – it was hard to hold onto it while faced with the beauty of the lake’s surrounds, and it wasn’t like he could do anything about it anyway.

“Here it is,” Link announced needlessly. “Has it changed much?”

Shade glanced across the lakeshore. “Less than Castle Town, certainly.” He pointed at Fyer and Falbi’s creaking monstrosity of a pier. “That’s new.”

Link grinned. “It’s not that old even to me. They only had their Grand Reopening this year. I’m not sure how their business model is going to hold up, though. Not a lot of demand for travelling by canon or paragliding with cuccos.”

“They charge for that? I used to just grab cuccos and leap off the roof of buildings for free,” Shade said.

Link paused, and tried to picture it. The Hero’s Shade? Impossible. This strange one-eyed man who seemed to delight in deliberately rocking the fishing boat and wanted to spar for the hell of it after watching him fight once? …Still difficult to imagine, but with each new fact he learned, it became less so.

It was easy to pass the time at the lake – to while away most of the day fishing, and spend the night grilling their catch over a campfire and admiring the moonlight reflecting off the lake’s waters. They spent the better part of three days doing just that, broken up only by exploring the surrounds and taking care of the horses. Shade whittled a flute in the quiet moments, while Link took bits of charcoal from the campfire and tried his hand at sketching. It wasn’t something he’d ever tried before, but Ashei had made him interested, so he’d got his hands on some paper and now took the opportunity to practice whenever he found himself idle. He didn’t handle boredom well, and inexplicably it turned out there was far more downtime travelling on the road than there had been when he had a herd of goats to tend to.

“May I see?” Shade asked as he paused to switch out for a newer piece of charcoal.

Link hesitated, but handed it over. “It’s not very good.”

Shade took it, tilting it towards the campfire to get a better look. “I disagree – you clearly have some talent.” Carefully, he handed it back. “Who is she?” he asked gently.

Link looked down at it. Midna’s face – as he remembered it – stared back at him.

Truthfully, he rarely drew anything else. Some part of him was too scared about forgetting what she looked like. Sometimes, in the depths of the night, he wondered if it was why he’d suddenly decided that drawing, of all new pastimes, was the one he wanted to try his hand at.

“Her name was – _is_ – Midna,” he said. “I mentioned her, before.”

“Ah.” Shade poked at the fire with a stick. “Your companion on your journey, if I recall correctly.”

“Right.” Link took a deep breath, and then the words just started spilling out. How they met, how she helped him on his journey, how he’d nearly lost her, how he _thought_ he’d lost her in the battle against Ganondorf. It felt good to tell someone about her – someone other than Zelda, at least.

“This sketch doesn’t do her justice,” he concluded morosely. “But it’s all I have, so it’ll have to do.”

“You loved her?” Shade asked.

Linked stared at the sketch. It suddenly looked so ugly to him – it didn’t come even close to representing everything she’d been. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I did.” His throat felt tight.

“You miss her still, then.”

Link clenched his fists. “She just – she _left_ , so suddenly. There was barely any warning. She was with me every minute of the day for months, we went through so much together – and then she was just _gone_ , somewhere I couldn’t follow.”

“Ah.” Shade placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. It felt heavy. Grounding. “Though I cannot completely relate, I know well what that is like, and it is not an easy thing to move past.”

“How do you?” Link asked, a trifle desperately. “How do you move past it?”

His hand fell away, and the words, when they came, were achingly quiet. “If you ever find out, do let me know.”

They didn’t talk any more that night. Shade went back to whittling his flute, and Link tossed the sketch into the fire. He watched the paper curl and blacken in silence, then turned over a new page and started again.

* * *

To Link’s relief, Shade didn’t treat him any differently after their conversation the night before, greeting him the same as he always did in the morning, and though they were both quiet, there was no tension in the silence. They still had plenty of food from their hunting and fishing the days before, and the horses were happy, so Link showed his mentor the Howling Stone near the Lake, and apparently it was a song new to him which led to him spending half an hour reproducing it on his half-whittled flute while he goaded Link to howl along as a wolf. It led to a somewhat painful cacophony, but lifted his mood all the same.

“Do you know many other songs?” Link asked once he transformed back.

“Many,” Shade said. “Though I prefer an ocarina – it might be hard to play some of them on this.”

“An ocarina? I think there’s one at home in Ordon.” Link frowned, trying to remember. “In a chest of my mother’s things.”

“Oh, she played?” Shade asked.

“No, not at all. She preferred singing, I think. She said she inherited it from her grandfather?” Who was probably Shade’s son or grandson. “Any chance that it’s yours?”

“Sadly, no. I had two, and kept both with me at all times. That they are not with me now means they are likely lost to time.”

Possibly something Malon had told her child about their missing father then. Link could imagine it – if he’d heard either of his dead parents had a fondness for the ocarina he might have looked for one and tried to learn it himself. “You can have this one then,” Link decided. “Assuming it’s still in good enough condition – I haven’t looked at it in years.”

“You are far too generous – I couldn’t possibly accept,” Shade protested. “Isn’t it an heirloom?”

Link scoffed. “Better it goes to someone who’ll use it than sitting in a chest under the bed. And it keeps it in the family, doesn’t it?”

Shade went quiet at that. “You are too kind,” he eventually murmured. “If it weren’t for you I’d-” He cut himself off abruptly.

“You’d what?” Link asked.

“I’m grateful,” Shade said, suddenly stiff, face turned away. “I’ve been thrown out of time before, but always there was a clear quest – some task to be done, some threat to be stopped. Here, however, if it weren’t for you…” He stopped, taking the time to choose his words carefully. “I would be truly at sea, I suppose.”

Guilt spiked in his stomach. He was the reason Shade was here, after all, and it was a sharp reminder that he hadn’t yet made clear why. “Is that still bothering you?”

“It’s an adjustment,” he said. “This Hyrule seems to not need even one hero, much less two. You’ve experienced it yourself, haven’t you? The sudden void after your quest is done.”

He had. The days had seemed endless until Zelda’s missive had arrived, summoning him to the castle. “I guess I _was_ at loose ends,” he admitted. “I wasn’t lying when I said that Zelda’s suggestion that I show you around was for me as well. I thought putting down the Master Sword might help – close the door on ‘hero-ing’ – but I just picked my old sword right back up and went wandering instead.”

“Ah. I’d been meaning to ask, actually, what happened to the Master Sword,” Shade said.

“It’s back at the Sacred Grove,” Link assured him. It raised a question, though – one he felt safe enough to ask, given Shade brought it up. “Why did you put it there in the first place? I expected it to be inside a Temple, or something.” It seemed to him far more valuable than many of the things the temples guarded.

“It was, once. It used to seal the way to the Sacred Realm, and the Triforce,” Shade answered. “But after the Triforce broke apart, there was nothing left to guard. Then civil war began to brew again, and I convinced the Queen it would be better to put it somewhere safe, and out of the way.”

“It worked, so I guess I can’t argue with results,” Link commented. “Still, it was just out in the open. After 100 years, you weren’t worried someone might stumble across it?” He'd had a guide, but it wasn't hard to imagine, over enough years, that someone might find the way by pure chance.

“Unlikely. That place is protected by powerful magic,” Shade informed him.

“Yours?” Link asked.

He hummed at that. “Only a very small portion of it. There's the power of the sword itself, but the land upon which it rests is also steeped in old magic, and under the watch of the Sage of the Forest – the Forest Temple is nearby, after all?” Link nodded in confirmation. “Even if Saria and the Deku Sprout moved on, their magic would linger for years – longer than even the seal which trapped Ganondorf, apparently. I tapped into those energies instead when I placed the sword there, and gave an old friend the key, so to speak, to lead a trusted party past. Some of the other Sages added their own enchantments and protections too, of course, as additional measures. Rauru had some strange plans for a new Temple of Time as well, I believe.”

“Wow.” He considered it. “Maybe we should head to Ordon next, then. It’s my home. We can swing past the Sacred Grove on the way. I don’t know any magic myself, so maybe you want to check the protections around it?” Link suggested. “I didn’t do anything special when I put it back.”

“I’m no Sage, but if it would set your mind at ease,” Shade said. He frowned. “No magic? You have the potential for it, though.”

Link blinked. “I do?”

“Of course.” Shade brushed his long hair aside to tug on one of his silvery earrings. “The pointed ears. Not everyone with them is equally talented, of course, but it’s a strong marker for the ability. Among Hylians, anyway. Gerudo and Zora and Gorons all have their own tells.”

Link shrugged. “I never knew. But then, I was never really the scholarly type. I left the magic to Midna and Zelda.” It was nice, though, to finally have a reason for his ears that had marked him an outsider in Ordon. Though of course, after meeting his ancestor in the flesh, it had made sense – his ears were pointier than even Zelda’s. “Oh, did uh, Malon, have it? Were her ears pointy too?”

He winced internally at bringing her up again, but Link was dying to know. Luckily, Shade seemed to be in a good enough mood, as he simply grinned and said, “Of course! Nearly everyone in my time had them – not having them was rarer, you had to wander into the far outskirts of the kingdom before they became less common. Not the case in this current era, it seems.”

“No,” Link admitted. “I was the only one in Ordon. But then, the village is right on the outskirts of Hyrule. I’ve never been over the mountains or past the Misty Woods, but I’m told there’s only ocean, beyond.”

“How far is it?”

“On Epona? A full day and night of hard riding from Castle Town. Travelling normally, it will probably take us about a week from here.” Longer if they detoured to the Sacred Grove. But there was no rush – Link wasn’t even sure how he felt about going back to Ordon at all, just yet. It still felt strange – how little the village had changed, and how much he had. But he wanted to show it to Shade, and to introduce him to the people who had been his surrogate family before. It felt like the right thing to do.

It did bring up a problem, however. “I’m not sure how to introduce you, though. Do you want people to know you’re from a hundred years in the past?”

“In my experience, no one would believe it,” Shade commented softly. “They’ll just think us both crazy.”

That was true. There were large parts of his adventure Link hadn’t shared with anyone for similar reasons, for being too outlandish or too horrific – his encounters with the Hero’s Shade, his transformation into a wolf, ghoul rats and ooccoos in general. “What should I say then?”

Shade shrugged. “I’ll leave it up to you. It doesn’t particularly matter to me.”

Link couldn’t see how – it was his _identity_ they were effectively establishing in Hyrule. Didn’t he care what it was? Even if they had to edit his personal history to make it believable. But then, he still didn’t know exactly what Shade’s story _was_. He had the rough shape of it thanks to Zelda’s research and what had been shared with the Princess over their first meeting, filled in with occasional comments Shade made as they travelled, but there remained something _off_ about it all. Something missing, something left unsaid.

He had a week, maybe more, though, before they got to Ordon. Time enough to work it out. He’d already learned so much, and they’d been travelling together only a little more than a week. In that time again, who knew what else he might learn? He’d shared so much of himself, but he had so many questions about his mentor still. About his journeys, his Hyrule. Where did he learn to fight? How did he and Malon meet? How did he lose his eye?

How did he die?


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was hoping to be finished by the end of the year but it might be a couple of days after now. Hard to find the time to write and edit in the busy end of year, so thanks for your patience at the erratic updates. Hope everyone is having a lovely holiday season.

They journey to the Sacred Grove was largely peaceful. Without shadow beasts to worry about or King Bulbin causing havoc, the most trouble they encountered was the odd stray deku baba. Plenty of danger still lingered off road or at night, but the main roads of Hyrule were becoming safe again – safer than they had been even before Zant’s incursion.

It wasn’t boring, though. It was simply nice. The wilds of Hyrule were beautiful, and with Shade’s company to keep the loneliness and memories of Midna at bay, and their combined prowess rendering any threat the land could offer them harmless, Link found himself starting to relax properly for the first time since Ganondorf’s demise. They took their time, diverting course to pick mushrooms or hunt fresh game or raid a wild apple tree, to poke around any cave or pit they found, or chase after interesting bugs for Agitha. They made camp every sunset and left well after sunrise and stopped to bathe and wash their clothes in the river twice. When they got to Faron woods, they spent an afternoon competing on their horseback archery – which Link won far more easily than he had their swordfight, leading to him giddily demonstrating his technique to an appreciative Shade.

As they wandered deeper into the woods, though, heading towards the Forest Temple, his travelling companion grew quiet, looking around almost wistfully.

“Are you looking for something?” Link felt compelled to ask.

“For someone,” Shade corrected. “Are there fairies near here, perchance?”

“There’s some that hang around Faron Spring, nearly always,” Link answered. He didn’t like how distracted Shade looked. “It’s on the way to the village from the Grove. I’ve never seen many in this part of the woods though. Only the Skull Kid and his puppets.”

“Skull Kid?” Shade searched now with more intent. “So he _is_ still here, then?”

Link shifted awkwardly on Epona. “I haven’t seen him the last couple of times I came this way. I don’t know if he’s just hiding or…” An alarming thought occurred to him. “Did you _know_ him?” Was that dangerous little imp that _ancient_?

“He was an old friend.” Shade pulled Grey to a stop, sliding off his back. Link followed suit a moment later. “And he’s been found,” he said, raising his voice.

Giggles danced in the trees around them, accompanied by the eerie rattle of wooden puppets. Link reached for his sword, but at a gesture from Shade stayed his hand. A moment later, the Skull Kid dropped out of the trees in front of them. “Back to play some more, mister hero? And you brought a friend this time, too!” He twirled on the spot. “I had a friend once, too, you know. He was _so good_ at hide and seek. Even better than you!”

“It’s good to see you too, old friend,” Shade said softly. “I’m impressed you’re still around. The forest has changed, after all.”

The Skull Kid just tilted his head at them, his strange, moon-shaped face blank. “Have we played before?”

“Don’t you recognise me?”

The Skull Kid skittered backwards, lantern jingling. “Can’t be, aren’t, you won’t trick me,” he sang, voice rattling like old bones. “He’s gone, like all the rest, I _watched_.” The imp disappeared back into the shadows. “I _watched,”_ he repeated, voice fading away.

“I came back!” Shade called into the forest.

“Tricks!” echoed back at them, followed by eerie, tittering laughter. “He _lied_. We were gonna play together _forever_. Now it’s only Skull Kid and his new _friends_.”

“Shit,” Link muttered, and drew his sword as half a dozen wooden puppets dropped from the trees around them. He slashed at the joints, sending one crumpling to the ground, before dancing back to avoid the lurching movements of another.

There was a roar of flame and heat as Shade shot out fireballs from his sword – a move he’d only seen the Hero’s Shade use before – that set the rest alight. The puppets collapsed, smoldering, and Link swiftly scrapped the last couple the fire had missed.

As the flames sputtered out, the forest was silent once more.

“He’s gone again,” Link sighed. “We’ll have to find our own way to the Grove. I think I can remember the way.”

“No need. I know it,” Shade said, though his gaze remained on the shadowy forest where the Skull Kid had vanished to.

“I’m sorry,” Link offered quietly.

Shade shook himself, visibly pulling himself together. “It’s not so surprising. It was a long time ago.”

“Not to you though, right?” Link put a hand on his shoulder. “What did he mean, anyway? About watching?”

“Who knows,” Shade said. “Best not to dwell too long on the words of those children.” He turned and moved deeper into the forest. “This way.”

Link stared after him. He was lying, he was sure of it. But what more could he say? There was nothing to do but follow.

Shade led the way confidently through the forest’s winding paths – even though surely after a hundred years the woods would have changed, that even Link hadn’t been able to navigate them the first time without a guide. Maybe it was the eeriness of the encounter with the Skull Kid lingering, but he looked strangely fey in the shadows of the trees, with his long blond hair and pointy features, head tilted as though listening to a song only he could hear – if it weren’t for the armour and the eyepatch, Link might have thought him another form of forest folk, the kind Uli would tell Colin scary stories about when he was too mischievous.

Perhaps all hylians had been like that a hundred years ago, but Shade’s presence struck him as peculiarly out of place. It made sense, of course – he was a hundred years out of time, in a land that was both familiar and not. Link couldn’t even imagine it. But it still sat wrong. Something was still _off_.

“We’re here,” Shade said as the trees began to give way to ruins. Link followed, quiet. Something about the ruins, and the Grove, seemed to beg his silence and respect, even after everything.

From there, it was a short walk to where he’d left the sword, in the same pedestal he’d found it. The sunlight in the Sacred Grove was as gentle as always. Strangely hazy, which he now attributed to the presence of magic and enchantments instead of a quirk of the atmosphere. And in the center of it all, the Master Sword stood gleaming, as pristine as the day he’d left it there, only a few short months ago.

Shade walked around the clearing, humming lightly to himself, pausing here and there to lay a careful hand on an exposed tree trunk or a bit of stone.

He never once approached the sword, though. He seemed to avoid even looking at it.

“The magic has faded somewhat,” he eventually reported. “Some of the enchantments likely fell once the sword was removed from here. I can restore the simpler ones. It will keep it safe enough - the sword is not one to be wielded by those it does not choose.”

That was a relief, at least. Still, there was an odd sort of discomfort. “You don’t seem to like it, much. The Master Sword,” Link noted cautiously.

Shade grimaced. “Ah, am I that obvious?”

“Can I ask why?”

He paused, seeming to choose his words carefully. “The blade is powerful, and worthy of its legend. But I was young, and unprepared for the burden. I didn’t understand what it meant to be chosen by the blade until long after it already happened. I was weighed down with grief and guilt and doing nothing more than the Great Deku Tree’s final request.”

“The Great Deku Tree?” He’d mentioned him before, Link remembered, but at the time he hadn’t thought to ask more.

“He was, I suppose, the closest thing I had to a parent,” Shade admitted. “Though it’s rather complicated.”

As all things to do with the Hero of Time seemed to be. That brought on a dozen more questions, but there was really only one that mattered, right then. “Do you resent it?” Link asked. “Being chosen?”

“Do you?” Shade replied.

Link shook his head. “The sword was a blessing, for me. I’m grateful to it, because I wouldn’t have survived without it, but I had already decided to do everything I could to help Midna and save Hyrule before I even knew it existed. At the time, I didn’t realise being chosen was such an honour.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” Shade moved to a spot in the east of the clearing, removed one of his gloves and pressed his hand to the ground. “Here,” he beckoned. “This is the simplest bit of magic I can teach you – providing power to an enchantment that already exists.”

Link went, crouching next to him. It was an obvious change of topic, but an interesting one. “Glove off,” Shade instructed. “Your left hand.”

He hesitated – that was the hand with the Triforce mark. Still, he did as instructed, and Shade didn’t react to the sight of it beyond a brief flick of his eye. Of course, he already knew it was there, but he’d seemed unnerved by it the first time he’d seen it. He mimicked his position, with his palm flat against the cool dirt. “Like this?”

“Can you feel a sort of energy thrumming underneath the earth? There’s a buried slab here, the anchor stone for the protections woven a hundred years ago. When you pulled the sword, some of them released – we just need to restart them. Try pushing your energy down into it, like filling a bucket in a well,” Shade coached.

Link closed his eyes. He _did_ feel something – it reminded him of the heavy presence of the Light Spirits, or the strange feeling in the room with the Triforce, or the sleeping statues in some of the Temples.

He reached deep, searching in himself for something that mirrored it. There was nothing obvious. So he just tried to think of it like he was pushing a boulder that wouldn’t move, but instead of using his legs he willed more strength to his arms.

Something seemed to click, and it was like energy flowed out of him like water, sinking into the earth in a rush. It was dizzying, and he only stopped when Shade gently grabbed his hand and lifted it from the ground.

“That’s enough,” he said. “Well done. You’re a natural.”

“It felt a bit like using the Great Spin,” Link murmured, awed.

“Ah, so you _do_ know some magic after all then,” Shade said.

“That’s magic?” Link blinked. “You taught me it.”

“How very sneaky of me.” He stood, dusting off the bottom of his tunic. “That protection should now hold for another hundred years – providing nothing on the level of Ganondorf’s power seeks to undo it.”

“That’s good news, I guess.” Link wobbled briefly as he stood.

Shade caught his elbow and steadied him. “Easy there. Hm. Perhaps I should have brewed up some green potion before having you attempt that. It might be simple magic, but you’re young yet, and it asked a hefty amount, even with the burden halved.”

“I’m fine,” Link protested. “Just a little tired.”

“If you’re sure. Still, wait here while I check the surrounding stones. I can handle the rest.”

Link watched him as he moved around the clearing in a circle – always well clear of the sword at its centre.

“You didn’t answer my question, earlier,” Link said once he completed the circuit. He was feeling particularly brave, apparently. Maybe it was the tiredness talking – or something about the tranquility of the Sacred Grove made him feel like he could speak of things he rarely dared even think.

“Which question?”

“If you resented being chosen.”

He was silent for a moment. “I don’t blame the sword for anything that happened to me,” he eventually said. “But it is a reminder of many things, and not pleasant ones.” He glanced at it, then just as quickly glanced away. “This sword declared me a hero, and I spent my life struggling to live up to that ideal. You, however – you were already a hero before the sword chose you as its wielder.”

“That wasn’t what you said to me before. Your ghost, that is,” Link pointed out.

“Is that so? I can only speculate I didn’t see enough to judge you fairly.”

“I think you thought I was going to get myself killed,” Link admitted. “And honestly, if you hadn’t intervened, you probably would have been right.”

“Ah.” Shade nodded. “I understand, then.” He patted him on the shoulder. “Then regardless of whatever happened before, know now that you truly are a wonderful hero. A far better one than I ever was.” And with that, Shade turned to leave the grove.

Link stood there, staring at the Master Sword, and wondered why the words only filled him with fear and dread instead of warmth and pride.

* * *

Link was tired and dragging his feet when they arrived at Faron Spring that afternoon – and dispirited for reasons he still couldn’t figure out. Shade’s words continued to linger in the back of his thoughts as he turned them over and over, trying to make sense of what exactly was bothering him so badly.

He wanted to believe it was just overtiredness. Magic took a lot of strength, it turned out, but he didn’t want to disappoint Shade so he didn’t say anything about it. Luckily, just stepping into the spring’s water began to restore his energy – he felt more awake, his body ridding itself of a heaviness he hadn’t noticed until it was gone.

Shade joined him in the waters, but he seemed to only have eyes for the fairies flitting about the spring. While they tended to ignore Link at best, as soon as Shade entered the spring they clustered around the older man like curious cats, flitting about his shoulders, one even brave enough to poke at his eyepatch, another perching on his head to play with his long hair.

Link gaped. Shade, for his part, looked… disappointed?

“Is something the matter?” Link asked.

“No.” Shade held out a finger, and one of the fairies perched on it, crooning. “Thank you, little one, but fortunately we won’t require your healing today,” he said softly. The fairy almost seemed to shrug, before flitting off back to the depths of the spring. Shade sighed. “It’s been a hundred years. Of course she wouldn’t be here. She couldn’t be. But I can never stop hoping…”

Link tried to make sense of that. “That someone you were looking for?”

“A fairy I once knew,” was all he said on the matter – tone so final Link didn’t feel right pushing it. He didn’t know how long fairies lived, but not many creatures in Hyrule lived for more than a hundred years. The Zora were the only ones he knew for certain – and now the Skull Kid. But he had the notion that even the Skull Kid was an outlier.

“The fairies like you,” he observed instead. “I’ve never seen them behave like that with anyone.”

“I suppose to the fairies, at least, enough of the forest still lingers,” was all Shade said to that.

Cryptic, as always. Link looked around the spring for some sign of Faron, but the light spirits remained elusive. He’d never seen them before Zant’s incursion, so he supposed it wasn’t surprising not to see them after. It did lend a strange air of unreality to much of his journey though – fleeting moments with the dangerous and fantastical that now, in the times of peace, seemed like a fevered dream.

He was still having difficulty adjusting to not being on edge constantly. Still adjusting to Midna’s absence. Shade’s presence had been helping – with both the company, and the concrete reminder that at least one part of his journey persisted, that life hadn’t simply reverted completely to normal. He presented mystery enough that it kept Link occupied, but in moments like this, it struck him how much had changed. How much he’d seen and experienced that the average resident of Hyrule would never even know about much less see for themselves.

The void of peace, as Shade had mentioned.

“There’s three other springs like this one,” Link said. “I can show you them later. One of them – Ordona’s – isn’t far from here, it’s right by the village. Ordon’s named for it. Even if there’s no chance, it can’t hurt to look, right?”

Shade nodded, distracted.

Link cleared his throat. “Ready to go on our way then?” As rejuvenating as Faron’s spring was, he never felt right lingering too long. Much like the sacred grove, there was something divine about the place, as though regular mortals were merely guests who were perilously close to overstaying their welcome.

“Yes, of course,” Shade murmured, and gestured for him to go first, even as his gaze dwelled on the forest beyond.

“I actually met you – or rather, your shade – not far from here, for the first time,” Link said, suddenly eager to fill the silence, to chase away the strange pit growing in his stomach. “Nearly scared me witless, though. I thought you were a wolfos.”

Shade finally turned his attention back to him at that, eyebrows arched. “A wolfos?”

“A golden one. That’s how you appeared to me, outside of the Ghostly Ether. I think I mentioned it before – the spirit wolf?” Link grinned. “I’m a little jealous. Gold certainly seems a more heroic colour for a wolf than grey.”

“And yet no less terrifying at first sight, if it was enough to startle you.”

“I was still pretty green at being a hero then. I don’t think I very much impressed you at first.”

“So you said. Yet who won our last two competitions? Both swordplay and archery,” Shade reminded him.

“Still convinced you went easy on me.”

“No easier than you went on me, I suspect. And in archery, I have much to learn to approach your precision under pressure,” Shade said easily.

“It’s just a matter of – wait, did you hear that?” Link straightened, hand going to his sword. There was rustling in the underbrush, off the path. Too much of it.

Shade fell quiet, slowing his pace. “The birdsong has stopped,” he murmured.

That was all the warning they got before suddenly dark, spidery forms burst from the underbrush, running for them in a cacophony of shrieks and chitters. “Gohmas!” Link gasped in warning, drawing his sword and cutting the one rushing him down in one frantic sweep of his blade. Four of them, at least. He swore and kicked out as one tried to sink its fangs into his boot, whirling and stabbing it straight in the eyes. It screeched in furious pain.

The remaining two backed off, hissing, forelegs raised menacingly. Link didn’t hesitate, cutting straight through one raised leg to bury his blade in the eye on its back. He didn’t even wait for the body to fall before he pulled his sword free, whirling to face the last one, driving forward, jamming the point into its face.

A familiar raspy roar had him spinning around an instant later. A _dynalfos_? Going straight for Shade, on his blind side, and the man was just standing there, watching him deal with the gohmas, unaware-

He reached out, a shout of warning on his tongue, _too late_ , _too slow_ -

With a flash of sliver, the dynalfos collapsed to the ground, and Shade casually lowered his sword.

_Mortal Draw_.

Link let his hand fall, though his fingers still trembled.

He shouldn’t have been so shocked. The Hero’s Shade had _taught_ him that move, after all. But he’d been completely nonchalant, barely even looking. Link had been convinced the man had been about to be skewered.

It made him wonder, for the first time, how his mentor developed the technique in the first place. And his mind skittered away from the thought like it _burned_.

“Everything alright?” Shade asked, as he wiped his blade clean of blood.

Link swallowed. His voice still came out shaky. “Yeah.”

“Good.” He wrinkled his nose as he glanced over the bodies of the gohmas. “I never was very fond of spiders.”

The Triforce had brought him back, had gathered the scraps of his mind, body, and soul, and delivered him as whole as it could. It had seemed too good to be true. Only now did Link realise it was a cursed wish after all – that there was nothing stopping him from dying _again_.

The fear gripped his heart – all the fiercer for having lost Midna, that now he could not even imagine losing Shade. It would destroy him.

_This_ was the source of his unease. This was what had been unsettling him from the very first day they left Hyrule Castle together. It cast every odd phrase from Shade’s lips in a new light, every strange encounter. He’d felt something was off from the very start, but it had been too easy to dismiss it as the strangeness of being a hundred years out of time, of coming to terms with a brush with death, of the void of purpose in a Hyrule that no longer needing saving.

This was more than that, he saw that now. This was the spectre of what led his mentor to becoming that haunted stalfos in the first place. This was nothing as simple as a misstep on the battlefield causing a hero to die too soon. There was trauma here, trauma unhealed - and if Link couldn’t fix it, there was nothing to say it wouldn’t happen _again_.

A slow, dreamy panic was taking hold, distantly familiar. The last time he felt it was when Midna had been dying on his back as he frantically rushed for Hyrule Castle, praying that Zelda could somehow fix it.

He couldn’t throw Shade on his back and rush him to Zelda, though. This wasn’t a problem that magic could fix. But the restless urge to do _something_ remained.

“We should hurry to Ordon,” he distantly registered himself saying. “Make sure none of the monsters bothered the village.”

“Of course,” Shade agreed, as though nothing at all was wrong. “Lead the way.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going through last chapter it's still a shocking mess so it'll be a few days until it drops. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy reading this one.

Link didn’t remember much about the journey to Ordon, beyond the strange swoop to his stomach when they stopped by Ordona’s spring and Shade’s disappointment only seemed to deepen. He was operating on instinct, his head churning with too many thoughts and worries to pay much attention, letting Epona lead the way.

They stopped just outside the spring to rest the horses and brush their coats and take a break in general. They could have kept going to Ordon – and Link burned to – but the rational part of him recognised that Ilia would have his head if she thought he’d been taking less than perfect care of the horses, and he wanted there to be good first impressions all around.

He was preoccupied with brushing Epona’s mane well-past necessary, when Shade suddenly said, “I’ll be back in a moment. There’s something I want to check out.”

Link turned. “Shade?” he asked. The man had been only a few paces behind him moments ago, but now was gone.

Everything crashed right back into hyper awareness. “Shade?” he repeated. Only the silence of the forest answered him.

Swearing under his breath, he fumbled for his shadow crystal, grit his teeth, and let the transformation take over.

Grey shifted uneasily at the sight of his wolf form, but Epona was used to it, which kept the old horse calm. Link didn’t pay them any mind, focused entirely on following the faint trail Shade had left behind.

A whine began to rise in his throat. It led directly off path, straight into the Misty Woods.

He didn’t waste any time, bounding into the dark forest after him. He couldn’t have gone far – and he hadn’t, he caught up to the other man in moments. He transformed back, grabbing his shoulder, adrenaline singing in his veins. “Where are you going?” he demanded, as the mist swirled around them. They were only a short distance into the woods, but the temperature had already dropped sharply, cool drops of moisture clinging to his skin, chilling him like snow.

“I wasn’t going far, just taking a quick look,” he replied slowly.

“This is the Misty Woods. It’s not safe for hylians,” Link said, physically dragging the other man back to the forest’s edge. His heart thudded in his chest with panic, and it didn’t ease until the mist thinned and they were standing clear of the trees again, the horses watching them placidly.

“It’s no different to the path to the Sacred Grove,” Shade protested. “It’s the Lost Woods, in my era. I’ve been there before. It was the home of the Great Deku Tree – back when he was alive. There’s no need to worry.”

“We’re not _in_ your time,” Link snapped. “And you said the Great Deku Tree is dead. There’s nothing in there now except wild animals and monsters. Believe me, I’ve been in there too. It’s not a nice place.” It had been dark, and heavy, in a way even the Skull Kid’s territory hadn’t been. Like magic soured, grown stagnant, and poisoned. Even with the lantern, even as a wolf, he didn’t like it in there, and the thought of Shade just walking in, without either…

Shade gave him an odd look. “You’re… worked up about this.”

“Promise me you won’t try to go back in there,” Link commanded. “Not without me.”

“Okay,” Shade said, carefully extracting himself from Link’s grip, voice soothing. “I promise.”

Link glared at him, searching for the hint of a lie, and couldn’t find one. His travelling companion was cryptic, and tricky, but everything he’d seen so far assured him that if nothing else, he was a man of his word.

He was shaken by that unsettling suspicion, that terrible knowledge. And then Shade had just wandered into the Misty Woods without a care – for what? Just to look around? “What were you even looking for?”

“I suppose I wanted to confirm something,” he said. “But, from what you’ve said… maybe it’s not necessary.” Then, as though in peace offering, he explained, “I know how dangerous those woods can be. But, given your reaction, perhaps I underestimated how much more dangerous they’ve become over the years.”

“So long as you understand,” Link said, and struggled to quell the faint tremble in his hands. His adrenaline was still racing, restless energy with nowhere to go. “Ordon is close. Let’s get moving.”

Shade didn’t protest, running his fingers quickly through Grey’s mane then mounting up. Epona butted her head against his shoulder when Link was slow to follow – sensing his distress, most likely. He patted her nose with a murmured thanks. She really was the best.

The pace he set to Ordon was faster than he’d intended – maybe Epona sensing his mood, and upping the gentle trot to a canter, Grey matching her stride. Within the hour, the trees began to be replaced by fields. The scent of fresh pine gave way to tilled earth, smoked wood, and cut hay. The gentle titter of birdsong faded for the distant bleat of goats and the rumbling churn of the water wheel.

Ordon hadn’t changed. Link paused for a moment in the town centre, struck dumb by just how little it had. He’d been gone for months, but everything was still here, as safe and inviting and homey as it always had been.

“Is that – Link! It is you!” Uli waved to him excitedly from the door of her house with one hand – the other occupied holding her baby.

“Uli!” Link waved back as she headed over to them. “Your daughter’s getting bigger,” he noted with a grin.

“She’s already crawling around the house, creating all sorts of havoc,” Uli said fondly with a loving look for the sleeping baby in her arms. “Rusl thinks it won’t be long before she starts walking, but I certainly hope not! She’s hard enough to keep up with already!”

“And Colin?”

“He’s been a dear, helping out around the house. But he’s out with Ilia today – Fado’s home sick, so they’re taking care of the goats until he’s better.” She turned her attention to Shade then, with a friendly, “-And who is this? Link, don’t be rude, introduce us!”

“Ah, right, this is Shade. Shade, this is Uli. She and Rusl looked out for me a lot, growing up.”

Shade nodded politely. “It’s good to meet you.”

“No need to be so formal,” Uli said. “Any friend of Link’s is a friend of ours.” She eyed Shade’s armour thoughtfully. “That’s some mighty nice armour you have there – are you a knight? I’ve never seen that design before.”

“Not at all, I just like to be well-protected,” Shade said. “The roads can be dangerous, sometimes.”

“That’s sensible,” Uli agreed. “Did the two of you run into any problems on your way here?”

“Just some monsters near Faron Spring,” Link replied. “We took care of them. Has there been any trouble in the village?”

“Not unless you count the goats getting out every other day. Rusl’s been doing patrols again, but he hasn’t come across anything other than the odd deku baba. He hasn’t gone past the Spring for a while, though – I’ll tell him to be careful.” She grinned, shifting her baby against her hip. “Maybe now _you_ can teach him a thing or two.”

Link just smiled, awkward. Uli turned to Shade, and bragged, “We’re all terribly proud of him, you might guess. A proper hero from our humble little village.”

“As you should be,” Shade assured her. “I’ve seen him in action, and it’s quite impressive.”

Epona saved him from finding some way to respond to that with a whinny and a head butt. Uli put a hand to her mouth. “Oh, I’m sorry, I got so excited I stopped you right here in the middle of the road! You can leave Epona and your horse in the field just over yonder – there’s plenty of grass and water for them, until you can clean out the spare stables,” she said, gesturing to an empty field near Sera’s Sundries.

Shade took Epona’s reins from him. “Let me, I’ll be back in a moment. You two can catch up.”

The moment he took the horses away, moving out of earshot, Uli leaned in close. “Um, Link is he-?” she asked in a hushed voice. “I mean, I don’t mean to pry, but the two of you-”

“He’s my cousin,” Link supplied. Shade looked far too young for him to claim him as a father, or even an uncle, but claiming him as a brother would likely only have raised questions. “We only found each other a couple of weeks ago.”

Uli beamed. “Is that so? Isn’t that wonderful? I thought so, you know, you can _see_ the family resemblance. And I don’t just mean the pointy ears either – though his are even pointier than yours! I never thought I’d see the day.”

Link could feel the heat rising on his face. “Is it that obvious?”

Uli patted him on the arm. “It really is. I might have guessed you brothers, but well, we all know that your poor mother- This is all beside the point though, we need to welcome him properly! Are you back in Ordon to stay? Is there room for you both in your treehouse?”

“There’s plenty of space in the treehouse,” Link assured her. “And… we don’t know yet. Maybe eventually, but for now we’re just back in the area to check up on some things in the forest. Nothing dangerous!” he hurried to assure her. “I’m mostly just showing him around.”

“Isn’t that just lovely,” she said, with a smile that made him feel like he was curled up by a warm hearth. “You let me know if there’s anything I can help with though, won’t you? And you both _must_ come for dinner – there’s no getting out of it! Rusl will want to meet him – and Ilia too, I’ll invite her and her father as well - she’ll be so disappointed that she wasn’t here to be the first to greet you back!”

Link rubbed the back of his neck nervously. “I’m sorry for not sending word ahead. I should have sent a letter, or Epona-”

“I won’t be having any of that, it’s hardly the important thing here. Now tell me, this cousin of yours – any likes or dislikes? Any allergies?”

“Um, none that I’ve noticed. He’s eaten all the same things I have,” Link stammered under Uli’s assault.

“Of course. The two of you are family, after all,” she said with a nod, and Link’s stomach danced at the words. “I’ll avoid anything spicy then – unless you’re better with spice now? No, I’ll play it safe,” she muttered to herself. “Some cheese, definitely, we have to show the best that Ordon has to offer…”

“We’ve got mushrooms,” Link blurted, digging through his bag. “And some leftover game from hunting – I think that’s in Grey’s saddlebags. Don’t empty your stores on our account.”

“Oh! Thank you, this will help,” Uli said. “It’s no trouble at all though – it’s a good excuse for everyone to get together for a meal! We have to celebrate!” She gauged him for a moment as she took the bag of mushrooms from his hand. “But Link… is something bothering you, by any chance? You look troubled. Is there another reason you’re back here?”

Uli was perceptive – she always had been when it came to him. Maybe it was just her instincts as a young mother, or habits formed out for worrying over her husband, but she had uncanny ability to spot when something was on his mind. He'd put up a good face, but he was still rattled from that brush with the Misty Woods just before they arrived.

“I’m worried about him. Shade,” Link confessed in a hushed voice. He’d rushed Shade to Ordon in the same fashion he’d rushed Midna to Zelda – only now they were here, he wasn’t sure what to do next. “I’m worried that he’s… unhappy.”

Uli made a small noise of concern. “He does seem to be the troubled sort, doesn’t he? Running around in armour even when he’s not a knight. And his eye – he must have been through a lot.”

“Yeah,” Link murmured. It seemed an understatement – and that was with how little of the details he knew. “I don’t know what to do about it. He’s so secretive about it.”

“Is he now?” She glanced over to where Shade was just finishing up with the horses. “Well, if it helps, there’s one thing absolutely clear to me.”

“Yes?” Link tried not to look too eager.

Uli’s eyes all but sparkled. “That he’s fond of you.”

Link stared at her, baffled. She laughed.

“Don’t look so surprised! It’s obvious, even after only one conversation. He might not be the most expressive, but you can tell he pays extra close attention to anything pertaining to you.”

That was… he wasn’t sure what to do with that.

Uli patted him on the arm. “You just be there for him, Link. Sometimes that’s all you can do.”

Except he’d been doing that already. It wasn’t enough. But how could he explain to Uli, without sounding crazy?

“Am I interrupting anything?” Shade asked, standing a respectful distance away still. He looked awkward and out of place again – even more than he had in Castle Town. But of course, he didn’t have anywhere to _go_ in Ordon without Link. He didn’t know anyone, or anything – or even have any reason to be there, other than the fact that Link had desperately wanted to bring him here.

“Just making plans for dinner. You’re both invited, and I won’t take no for answer,” Uli said cheerfully. Her daughter started to make unhappy sounds on her hip. “Oh, this little one is waking up – it’s about time to feed her. The two of you should go get settled in, but I expect you back here at sundown! Don’t be late!” And with that Uli was gone again.

“So uh… this is Ordon,” Link said needlessly into the sudden silence. “Come on, I’ll show you my house. There’s some stables near it for the horses, but we’ll have to clean it up first. No one really bothers keeping it ready when I’m gone.”

Shade drifted along after him as Link made his way through the village. Everyone was mostly out working in the fields at this time of day – though Link spotted Jaggle napping under a tree just out of sight of Sera’s Sundries. It was a happy coincidence of timing – he selfishly wanted to show Shade Ordon first without a crew of people stopping him to chat and catch up and gossip. Once the word got out, he was sure the entire village would both know he was back and with company within minutes, and they wouldn’t get another moment’s peace until the novelty wore off.

“You’re my cousin, by the way,” he muttered as they made their way to the treehouse.

Shade simply nodded agreeably. “I see. That will work.” He glanced around, expression neutral. “Your village is lovely. Very… peaceful.”

Link didn’t like how that word sounded coming from Shade’s lips. “Some might say too peaceful,” he joked weakly. “When the children got kidnapped, I think some of them were almost as excited as they were scared.”

Shade didn’t comment on that – his gaze drifting to the east again, as the trees grew close on the village’s edge. They walked the rest of the short distance to Link’s home in silence that for the first time felt uncomfortable – at least, to Link. Shade looked as though his thoughts were an entire mountain range away.

“This is home,” Link announced as they arrived at the treehouse. “It’s not much, but there’s room enough for both of us for however long we decide to stay.”

Shade finally seemed to focus again, a hint of interest returning to his expression. “A treehouse?”

“Pretty neat, huh?” Link grinned.

“I used to live in one, as a child, but I could barely fit as an adult. This is far bigger.” He sounded impressed, walking around the front perimeter to inspect it from all sides.

It was a point of commonality between them Link never expected – another bit of history that went some small way to explaining things he’d simply always taken for granted. “Come inside, check it out!” Link urged, climbing the ladder to the front entrance.

It was musty inside – he’d been gone for some months after all, and had hardly been home for more than a day or two at a time in the months before that. Link wrinkled his nose and opened a window – the stables wouldn’t be the only thing that needed some cleaning to get habitable again. That could wait, though – he beelined for his bed, dragging an old chest out from under it, sneezing at the dust it kicked up. He carefully opened the lid, and there it was, right on top, as though waiting for him.

Shade entered the treehouse slowly after him, running a careful hand over the carved wooden walls. Link leapt back to his feet, hesitated for half a breath, then thrust his hands forward. “For you,” he muttered, suddenly embarrassed.

Shade blinked, then reverently took the ocarina from him. It was plain off-white ceramic with a basic glaze, but it was well-made – enough that even as a child Link had been careful of it, recognising it as expensive and likely to get him in trouble if he broke it. “It’s beautiful,” Shade said, fingers curling around the instrument with practiced familiarity, finding the holes almost unconsciously.

“Play a song?” Link suggested.

“Hmmm.” Shade glanced outside. “It wouldn’t do to ruin the nice weather,” he mused. “Ah, I know. The only appropriate song for the occasion, I think.”

He closed his eyes, swaying gently as he played a familiar sequence of notes – and then more beyond.

It was Epona’s song, in what he guessed was its full, original form. “It sounds a lot nicer on the ocarina than my whistle,” Link commented softly once the music faded away. “Glad to see it's in good hands.”

“I- thank you,” Shade murmured, seemingly at a loss for words. He stared down at the ocarina in his grip, a strangely troubled look on his face.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not really happy with how this fic turned out but glad to have it out of my head! Thanks for sticking with it to the end, and hope you enjoyed reading it.

They spent the rest of the afternoon getting the house habitable and cleaning out the stables for the horses, then Link bullied Shade into getting ready for dinner at Uli’s. At his urging, Shade had removed his armour, replacing it with a plain forest green tunic. Underneath it he wore a long, form-fitting black sleeved shirt and black leggings - the only part Link allowed from his normal ensemble. The tunic was one almost certainly provided by Zelda – though simple in design, the material was high-quality, and the colour so similar to Link’s own tunic that he felt certain she’d done it on purpose. Shade had then brushed and tied back his long hair into a single thin ponytail, and Link pronounced him ready for dinner at Uli and Rusl’s.

He’d used the excuse of propriety, but it was also a calculated attempt to make him less intimidating. He still had the eyepatch, of course, there wasn’t anything that could be done about that, but he wanted to make sure Mayor Bo and Rusl and Ilia would all welcome him. It was important to him in the way nothing else was, nothing since Midna.

He himself changed back into his normal village garb – which looked far more casual than his chainmail and green tunic, but was substantially _cleaner._

“I’m not sure if we went to half this much effort for dinner with the Princess,” Shade remarked once Link was finally satisfied.

“We didn’t have much of a choice, there,” Link said. “We definitely did everything wrong but I think she gets a kick out of it.” Looking back, what he now knew to be Sheikah guards and not just castle staff were probably less amused. He glanced outside, checking the time. The sun had almost finished sinking into the horizon, painting the clouds a myriad of rosy pinks and oranges. “We should probably head over now,” he decided. “Or we’ll be late.”

He thrummed with nervous energy as they made the walk back to Uli’s. Ordon was settling down for the evening – he could see lanterns going on in the windows as sunset gave way to dusk, and the faint aroma of baking bread wafted from Sera and Jaggle’s house. The goats had quietened – likely just fed – and the crickets had started chirping. It was looking to be a pleasant night.

The door was ajar when they arrived, affording them a glimpse of warm light from within and the murmur of voices. Link knocked on the door frame. “Hello?”

“Link!” Ilia’s cry was all the warning he received before the door was thrown open and her arms were around his neck.

He staggered back under her weight. “Oof. Hi?”

“You’re back!” She grinned at him, eyes bright. “You were gone so long! How are you? How’s Epona? What have you been doing, where did you go?”

“Settle down, girl, give the boy a chance to breathe,” Mayor Bo chuckled from the doorway. He nodded at him. “Good to see you again, Link. Great to have you back in Ordon. Place isn’t the same without you.”

“Oh, um, we’re not sure if we’re staying yet, but it’s good to be back,” Link said politely.

“Not staying?” Ilia’s face immediately fell. “But-”

“Link! Everyone’s here now! Come join us!” Uli beckoned them inside.

They were quickly ushered to the table – Link exchanged a nod and a smile with young Colin as he and Shade were seated and Uli put out the last of the dishes, urging everyone to serve themselves. She’d outdone herself – it was a feast more befitting a harvest festival than a family dinner, and an absolute miracle she’d made it all in one afternoon. She must have started cooking the minute they parted ways earlier in the day. “This looks amazing,” Link said. For as much as he’d stayed away, he couldn’t deny he’d missed Ordon’s food. He could cook a passable meal on a campfire but he’d run out of his stash of Ordon cheese weeks ago.

“Start eating before it gets cold,” Uli ordered, finally taking a seat herself as everyone added their own compliments.

They all did so – it was delicious and everyone was usually starving after a busy day. For a few minutes conversation was limited to passing dishes and condiments and drinks, then Rusl said, “So, Link, why don’t you introduce us to this new face at our table?”

“Oh, right, introductions.” He should have done that first – he’d just assumed Uli had already filled everyone in, and then Ilia’s greeting had thrown him off. He’d never had anyone to _introduce_ before – it still felt odd and novel. “Um, everyone, this is Shade. Shade, you’ve met Uli, this is her husband Rusl.”

“Nice to meet you. Uli mentioned you’ve got some fine armour,” Rusl said. “You do a bit of fighting, then?”

“A bit,” Shade answered vaguely. “Less these days, though.”

“We all do a bit less these days,” Rusl agreed. “And this is my son Colin, as well. Don’t be shy, son, say hello.”

“Hi,” Colin said softly. Shade gave him a warm smile in response.

“And this is Mayor Bo – he’s the head of the Village,” Link continued.

Bo nodded at him. “And my daughter, Ilia,” he said. “Her and Link have always been good friends, growing up.”

Shade nodded at them both. Ilia was staring at him with a hard look on her face – had done so since the moment they sat down to eat.

“So how do the two of you know each other then?” Mayor Bo asked, tone conversational but expression intent.

“He’s my cousin,” Link cut in, repeating what he’d told Uli earlier. “We only happened to meet up a few weeks ago.”

“Cousins!” Mayor Bo leaned back in his chair, rubbing his chin. “I should have guessed! You two do look alike.”

“Isn’t that wonderful?” Rusl agreed. “Who would have thought, after all this time, you would find each other?”

“Why now?” Ilia suddenly said.

The table fell silent, everyone turning to her. “Pardon?” Shade asked politely.

Ilia narrowed her eyes. “Why _now_? Where were you _before_?”

Link started panicking. They hadn’t worked on _that_ part of the story yet – and there was no way Ilia would accept Shade’s cryptic vague answers if he left it up to him.

“Ilia, darling…” Mayor Bo started to say.

Ilia’s hands were clenched into fists, and the expression on her face was the exact same one she wore whenever she thought Link had been careless with Epona. “Why did you _abandon_ him?” she demanded. “You’ve left him all alone, all this time!”

“Ilia, no! It’s not like that,” Link protested.

“He was _so_ lonely!” she said, near shouting, tears gathering in her eyes. “How dare you just… waltz in here like this, like you’ve always been around, when it was _us_ who were there for him!”

“Ilia!” Mayor Bo chided.

“You just come back in here, and take him away from us? What gives you the right?” She stood from her chair, the wood scraping harshly against the floor. “You don’t have the right!” she repeated, then, choking back a sob, bolted from table. A moment later, the front door slammed shut, as her footsteps receded into the night, and the room was left in awkward silence.

“Oh dear,” Uli murmured. “It’s getting dark, I hope she doesn’t go too far.”

“Shade, please, let me apologise for my daughter-” Mayor Bo started to say.

“It’s fine,” Shade said. Link looked between them, torn. Shade gave him a faint smile, and a nudge. “Go after her. You want to, don’t you? Best not to keep her waiting.”

“But-”

“I can find my own way back to the treehouse after dinner,” Shade said. “Go.”

“You’ll go straight there? Promise?” Link demanded.

“Of course.”

Link hesitated a second more, but he saw nothing but steady sincerity from Shade, so he muttered his apologies and hurried out of the house after Ilia.

It was still dusk, but there was no easy way to tell where Ilia had gone. They hadn’t been friends for years for nothing though – there were only so many places she tended to go when she was upset. She was mad with him, so she wouldn’t go to Epona, since she was near his house. It was getting dark, so he _hoped_ she wasn’t reckless enough to go to the Spring. She wouldn’t go home – she never went home when upset, she always preferred the outdoors.

That left the goats.

Link took off for Fado’s ranch at a brisk walk. The goats were making a small racket in the distance – a good sign. He followed the chorus of bleats to the far edge of the fields, and sure enough, he spotted Ilia’s blonde bob of hair among half a dozen young goats, all vying for attention.

He stayed quiet as he approached. Ilia would probably want a moment to compose herself, he reasoned – but he also struggled to find the right words.

She knew he was there, of course, so eventually, after petting the goats for a while, she said, “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“Okay,” Link said, and sat down near her. Almost immediately he had a goat of his own crowding him, demanding attention. He pet it, checking its horns and eyes and ears with practiced familiarity. The goats all looked in good health – Fado had evidently been managing fine without him, despite the regular break outs.

They sat there in silence, until dusk gave way to twilight, and Ilia finally said, “Why are you out here? Shouldn’t you be back there, with your _new_ family?”

He winced, but steeled himself. “That’s unfair. You know what it was like for me. You know how much I’ve wanted this.”

“I know,” she admitted, quietly. “But I never thought it would take you away from us.”

“It _doesn’t_ ,” he insisted. “I brought him here to meet everyone, didn’t I? I wanted everyone to accept him.” He lowered his gaze. An old goat – one he recognised – butted its horns gently at his shoulder. He gave it a distracted pat. “He didn’t even _know_ I existed until recently. He’s… I think he’s been alone a long time. I always had you, and your dad, and Colin and Uli and Rusl and Fado and the rest of Ordon. Even if we weren’t related by blood, I never took any of you for granted. But Shade - he doesn’t have _anyone_.”

Ilia looked away. “But you didn’t bring him back here, not really. You’re just going to leave again.”

Link understood, then, finally. This wasn’t jealousy of Shade at all. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I wanted to stay. But I had to go.”

“ _Why_?” she demanded. “What did we do wrong?”

“It wasn’t anything you did. It was just… I felt like I was going crazy,” Link confessed. “I’d changed so much but Ordon hadn’t. Here, it was like everything had barely even happened. I couldn’t cope.”

“I just wanted for things to go back to normal,” Ilia whispered.

Link shook his head. “It can’t go back to normal. It can’t. Not for me.”

“But why not?” she burst out.

“It just can’t,” Link said. “I _wish_ it could. I _tried_. I tried, and then I couldn’t bear it, and I left. I’m sorry. Maybe eventually… but not yet.” Maybe not ever, but it wasn’t like he hated a rancher’s life, that he disliked Ordon. It wasn’t even that he particularly loved adventuring – he just hadn’t been able to settle again. “I don’t know why. Maybe it’s guilt – that I should be doing more than just living a peaceful life, when I know I’m capable of more. Or maybe it’s distraction. It’s harder to forget, here. Harder to pretend.” It never made sense to him – it should have been the opposite. Maybe it was just the movement – the illusion of purpose. The hope that he would find _something_ to make it all go away.

He'd found that thing, with a wish on the triforce. A new quest, something to protect. A debt to repay, and a wrong to right, if he could just figure out how.

“I went through a lot too, you know,” Ilia murmured.

She had. Link didn’t forget. He didn’t know what to say to that, so said nothing.

“Sorry,” Ilia muttered, wiping at her eyes. It was dark enough that he hadn’t even realised she’d been crying. “I’m being selfish, it wasn’t the same. I know this thing with Shade – I _know_ how much it must mean to you, to finally have a family of your own. And I knew you were hurting before, too, even if you wouldn’t tell anyone why. I just – I can’t understand it.”

“I don’t need you to,” Link murmured. “I just need you to be okay with it. I didn’t do any of this to hurt you.”

She sniffled. “Okay,” she said. “I shouldn’t be this upset, it just – I got my hopes up, I guess.” She let out an awkward, fumbling laugh. “It’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid,” Link said softly.

They sat there quietly, in the dark, petting the goats, as the moon rose in the sky.

* * *

Eventually, Ilia was ready to go back, and Link escorted her to Uli’s.

“Link, Ilia, you’re back!” Uli greeted them at the door with a relieved sigh.

Link glanced around. Mayor Bo was still there, but the kids were gone – in bed, possibly – and so was Shade. “Your cousin’s already headed back,” Rusl told him, catching him looking. “We weren’t sure how long you were going to take.”

“He was lovely,” Uli assured him. “A little old fashioned for a man his age, but very nice.”

“Quiet lad, bit like you,” Rusl added.

It sounded as though things had gone about as well as they could have in his absence, then. Uli shoved a small lunch bag of dinner’s leftovers at him. “Here, take this. You barely got to eat at all before dinner got interrupted.”

“I’m sorry,” Link murmured.

“I’m sorry too, Uli,” Ilia said guiltily. “I was rude, and you worked so hard.”

“I understand. These things happen, and you’re still young,” Uli assured her with a smile. “You can make it up to us later.”

“Don’t go running about at night like that again though,” Mayor Bo grumbled. “I’m just glad Link was able to catch up to you and talk some sense into you before anything could happen.”

Ilia puffed up her cheeks. “He didn’t- oh, forget it.” She turned back to Link. “I’d like to apologise to your cousin later, too. You’re going to be staying a while, right?”

“I don’t know yet,” Link admitted. “But we should be here for a couple of days at least.”

“I’ll come by tomorrow then,” she said, apologised to Uli again, then she and her father left.

Link ducked his head at them. “I should get going too.”

“We’ll do this again properly another night,” Uli promised. “Don’t be strangers.”

Then Link was back out into the night, hurrying home. It had been a disaster but salvageable. He needed to talk to Shade as soon as possible though, to make sure there weren’t any new elements to his backstory he’d missed out on.

The treehouse was dark when he got back. Link paused, wondering if he’d somehow missed him – but there weren’t many other paths Shade _could_ have taken from Uli’s, and he _had_ promised he’d go right back. Had he gone to sleep already?

Link tried to be quiet as he climbed the ladder and eased open the front door, just in case. He lit the lantern in the entryway, and went to drop Uli’s leftovers on the table.

The ocarina was there.

Link paused, staring at it, heart suddenly pounding. He reached out, hand shaking, and picked it up. The ceramic was still faintly warm to the touch.

He ran to the bedroom, just in case. It was empty. He checked the other rooms, too. All empty.

Link grabbed his sword, slung it on his back, and ran outside again, ocarina still clutched in his grip. He turned, and ran straight for the forest, driven by terrible instinct.

He didn’t have to go far. Shade had kept his word, at least – he was at the edge of the woods closest to the treehouse. If Link had been looking, had his eyes been a little better adjusted to the dark, he might have seen him on his way back.

Had he panicked for nothing? “Hey,” he said, breathless from his frantic run.

Shade turned, then. “Ah, you’re back,” he greeted him. “Everything okay with the girl?”

“Yeah. We sorted it out. It was all my fault, really.”

Shade made a noise of understanding, and turned his gaze back to the woods, away from the meagre lights of Ordon.

It unsettled Link, how focused he seemed to be on the Misty Woods. Ever since they visited the Sacred Grove and met the Skull Kid, Shade had been increasingly distracted, as though listening for something only he could hear. He’d promised he wouldn’t go back, but…

He’d left the ocarina on the table. Link’s fingers tightened around it, as he wondered if he was reading too much into it.

He thought he’d been reading too much into things before, too.

He cleared his throat, chasing away the silence. “About what Ilia said-”

“Don’t worry about it. It’s good to see you have people who are concerned for you,” Shade said.

Link frowned. “I don’t want people thinking poorly of you due to a cover story.”

“Was it wrong, though?” he replied.

Link paused. That wasn’t where he expected this to go. “Sorry?”

“It might not have been you directly, but I did the same to your ancestor. Her words still apply, just not to the person she thought she was protecting.”

“You didn’t know! It wasn’t like it was intentional!” Link protested.

Shade shrugged it off. “Regardless, there’s no need to explain. As I said – she was looking out for you, and that’s all that really matters. Her opinion of me is secondary to that.”

“But it’s not secondary to _me_ ,” Link argued. “And anyway, I explained, and she wants to apologise. It wasn’t even about you, really. We both had some things to work out.”

“I’m glad, then, that you had the chance to talk,” Shade said politely.

Link summoned all of his courage – everything that made him worthy of the piece of the Triforce he bore. “I think it’s our turn now. I think we have to talk.”

He glanced at him. “Oh?”

Link held out the ocarina. “You left this behind.”

Shade stared at it, and didn’t take it. “Ah, I just thought, it might be safer…” His words withered, his gaze averted.

“Safer than with you?” Link challenged. “Why would you think that?”

Shade said nothing.

Link’s hand trembled. He was right. He was _right_ , and he desperately wished he wasn’t.

“I think,” he said. “You need to tell me how you died.”

Shade turned his face away, so all Link could see was his eyepatch. “I told you I don’t remember-”

“You don’t remember the Ghostly Ether – and maybe you don’t remember it happening. But you know, don’t you? When Skull Kid said he watched – you weren’t surprised.”

Shade didn’t reply.

Link bit his lip. Took a deep breath. “If I had to guess, it had something to do with the Misty Woods.”

He waited. He wouldn’t let his mentor put him off any longer. He’d avoided it, not wanting to make him uncomfortable, not wanting to unearth old wounds or freshen his regrets. But that had only left them to fester. He couldn’t fix things, not without knowing. His conversation with Ilia had shown him that.

Eventually, Shade began to speak, in halting, low tones. “I didn’t have a home after, well… everything. But those woods, they’re the closest thing to it.”

It made sense – it was in those woods he’d first encountered the golden wolf, and in those woods where he’d chosen to leave the Master Sword in the past.

“It wasn’t safe for hylians even then, but after the Great Deku Tree died, it became even less so. I knew this – the Deku Sprout warned me that he wasn’t as strong, that the magic would grow wild, that he couldn’t guarantee my safety, that even the Kokiri would have to relocate eventually. He told me not to come back anymore.”

“But you still went back in,” Link surmised.

Shade nodded. “More than once. I was looking for someone – a fairy, like I told you. And the risk of not making it back out again was worth it, to me – or so I convinced myself. In truth, I was… lonely, like I said, and desperate. And perhaps decided that a Hyrule that could not remember me, didn’t need me.” He looked away. “By the time I regretted that decision, well… I had already ventured too deep, I suppose.”

And so concluded the tale of the Hero of Time, and began the story of the Hero’s Shade.

“But… you tried to go back in before. On our way here.” The fear coiled around his throat, turning his words into whispers.

“I… yes.” Shade stared at his hand, and clenched it.

“ _Why_? When you regretted it?”

“I never regretted going in,” Shade said, and the light in his one blue eye was unnerving. Otherworldly. “I regretted not finding her.”

Link was left frozen, speechless.

He scrambled for words, for _anything_ , that could somehow cross a chasm so wide he didn’t even know where to begin. “But you… your ghost, that is – you said you regretted leaving Hyrule without a hero, without passing your knowledge on. That was the whole reason you trained me!”

“Perhaps that became true. I can only remember so much, after all.” He massaged his hand, then pulled his glove free. The skin was scarred, but there was no Triforce mark. “I am no longer a hero, however.”

Link glanced down at his own hand – at the mark he knew lay hidden beneath his fingerless gloves.

Shade stared at the back of his hand idly, the skin pale and unreal in the moonlight. Like a ghost’s. “For so long I carried that mark, I viewed it as a responsibility. A burden. A _curse_. I should be glad to be free of it, finally.” He curled his fingers, and let his hand drop, fixing his eerie gaze back on Link. “But then I wake to find it is a burden thrust upon you, upon my kin, and I would have taken it again to spare you it. At least, that’s what I told myself. But I think now, having met you – I am no longer worthy of it.”

“No,” Link choked out. “No that’s not- You’re the Hero of Time!”

“Was,” he corrected coolly. He smiled, then, but the expression was pained. “Can you imagine it? Me, as I am now, carrying the Triforce of Courage? I, who was too scared to move forward once everything was said and done? Who resented the responsibility, but didn’t know how to face peace, couldn’t bear the thought of it?” He turned back to the forest. “It was not bravery that led me into the Lost Woods time and time again. Quite the opposite.”

Link was trapped in stunned silence.

“My other ocarinas are no doubt in there, still. And it means much to me, that you offered it, that you consider our relation worthy of such a gift. But that ocarina is precious to you, and I could not bear the thought of depriving you of it, when we inevitably part ways.”

_That_ finally broke him from his stupor. “Part ways?”

Shade sent him a quizzical glance. “Yes?”

“You promised me,” Link accused. “You said you wouldn’t go back in there without me.”

“And I won’t,” Shade assured him. “Not while we’re travelling together.”

The panic was back, constricting his throat. “And when we’re… _not_ travelling together?”

“What about it? It wouldn’t matter to you then.” He looked puzzled. “Even if we’re family, of sorts, we’ll go our separate ways eventually. You surely can’t show me around Hyrule forever, can you?”

“I won’t,” Link said. “I won’t leave.”

Shade just seemed confused. “But… people leave. That’s what they do.” And he sounded _philosophical_ about it, like he was stating some universal truth.

“Not me,” Link said fiercely. “I won’t leave, ever. I _promise_.”

The look Shade gave him was full of doubt, even if he didn’t put it into words.

Link took a deep breath, marshalling all of his strength. He couldn’t avoid it any longer – saw now that he shouldn’t have avoided it even in the first place. “Look, there’s something you need to know. Zelda and I, we might have misled you about the wish on the Triforce that brought you back.”

_That_ caught Shade’s attention. “What do you mean?”

Link grit his teeth, and admitted, “It was me. As a reward for saving the kingdom, Zelda gave me one wish on the Triforce. That’s why you’re here now, and that’s why I _wanted_ to show you around Hyrule, even before Zelda suggested it.”

Shade looked as though he’d just dropped a bombling at his feet. “I- I don’t understand,” he murmured, shaken. “You said – you said you met my ghost only a handful of times. All I did was teach you to fight. Nothing more.” He shook his head, as though chasing the very thought of it away. “Why _me_? Why not Midna, who you so clearly yearn for even now?”

Link grimaced. “It’s – I won’t lie, Midna was my first thought. This wasn’t what I had in mind when I wished on the Triforce, but that it happened? I don’t regret it at all. It’s better, even.”

Shade just stared at him, lost. Link fidgeted for a moment, getting his thoughts in order. He wanted to say it right.

“I cared for Midna, I _loved_ her. But I saw her true form for less than a day before she left me forever.” He closed his eyes, fighting back the hurt. “I think the Triforce knew me better than I knew myself. That when I wished for Midna, I wanted the version of her back who had nothing better to do but be by my side as I travelled. But in the long term?” He sighed. “I’ll never know for sure, but I think she might have been miserable. She wasn’t the sort who could ever be content with a simple honest life doing farm work, but she wasn’t the sort who could accept a life on the road either. She was raised a princess, and even if she weren’t bound by duty, even if the Triforce made it possible for her to leave her people with no regrets, made it possible for her to live in the world of light – she would have still left.” He hunched his shoulders. The words were like acid in his throat, but he needed to say them – not just for Shade, but for himself. “She chose to shatter the mirror. She _chose_ to close the path between us forever.”

He looked down at the ocarina in his hands, voice small. “Please don’t do the same to me.”

“I…” Shade stuttered. “I can’t- I’m not-”

“There’s no more Lost Woods. There’s no more Great Deku Tree,” Link pleaded. “But there’s me. I’m here. We can make a _new_ home.” He grasped the Hero of Time by the shoulders, forcing him to look at him, demanding that single, bright blue eye to meet his gaze, to witness his sincerity. “I _want_ you here. I wanted you here bad enough that I wished on the Triforce for it.”

Shade wouldn’t meet his eyes.

Link desperately searched for the words, for anything that would reach him. “Please. I see my own future in you. A future where I never get over losing Midna. Where I just – go off and live as a wolf, disappear into the wilderness, and die of a broken heart for no good reason,” he said, fist tightening in the fabric of Shade’s sleeve. “So prove me wrong. Prove to me that there can be another ending for a Hero. Prove to me that saving Hyrule was _worth_ it!”

Shade finally turned to stare at him, single eye wide. Then he looked away, face taut, and when he answered, his voice was low and hoarse. “…You ask so much of me.”

Link’s fingers relaxed.

He had him. Shade had answered him. He hadn’t said no.

It was wretched, in a way, to anchor him like that. To put Link’s survival squarely in his hands. But it had _worked_. It got through to him right when he’d begun to despair nothing would.

Impulsively, he pulled him close. Shade stumbled, and Link threw his arms around him, burying his face in his neck. “Thank you,” he said, squeezing him tight. “I’m sorry, but… _thank you_. You’ve saved me so many times.” And just this once, just _once_ , Link could save his mentor in return. “Please never leave.”

Then slowly, uncertainly, Shade’s arms wrapped around him. They were warm. His form shuddered. Crying?

Link’s eyes were wet too, so he said nothing, just held on tighter.

When they finally broke apart, Link held the ocarina out again. This time, Shade took it, carefully, and cradled it to his chest. “I’ll take good care of it,” he whispered, voice rough. A promise. A pact.

Link managed a watery grin in response – it felt weak, and fragile, but was maybe the truest one he’d managed in a long time. “You’d better.”


End file.
